


Hostage Situation

by Fisticuffs



Series: A Fine Line [1]
Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Dark, Dubious Consent, Kidnapping, Knotting, M/M, Mpreg, Omega!Matt, alpha!Fisk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-02
Updated: 2017-06-29
Packaged: 2018-07-28 19:06:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 30
Words: 59,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7653229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fisticuffs/pseuds/Fisticuffs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One day is pure potential, with the power to reforge an entire chain of events.</p><p>Matt Murdock and Wilson Fisk meet before they are supposed to, and it has consequences.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sunny Afternoon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still don’t care very much for A/B/O fics, but here I am writing another one. It’s a convenient universe for mpreg, what can I say.
> 
> Dub-con warning, yes. Take note. But I don’t want to qualify it as full on rape. Consent is really tricky throughout this fic. Just be mindful before going any further. If you think for one second that you might not like it, please don’t read. And certainly don’t complain after, pretty please.
> 
> There aren’t many Fisk/Matt fics. Which I think is odd. I’ve watched every one of their (too few) scenes many times. There’s so much chemistry there. And each side of the discussion plays with the other so well in the perfect dialogue. Honestly, I thought there would be dozens of fics. But I can’t fault others for not creating if I don’t contribute either. So here’s this. And I hope you like it.

Matt heard everything. Car horns, their motors, the trembling muffler, the radio inside. People talking, walking, humming. He even heard the window washer five stories up. The man did not wet the glass well enough and the squeegee was catching with an unpleasant squeak.

And through all of that, Matt heard the bike messenger. He heard before a normal person would have. He listened to the path the bike was taking and predicted the one it would take.

It was the split second twitch that Matt could not anticipate. The cyclist’s foot slipped, or maybe his shoelace got stuck in the pedal. The bike jerked suddenly and headed right for him.

Matt took little time to make a decision. He could jump out of the way using a suspiciously evasive maneuver for a blind man— for any man— or he could let the bicycle plow into him.

Murdock boys knew how to take a hit.

The tire rolled up his leg. The rider and handlebars slammed into his back. He went down fast, and he went down hard. Matt dropped his walking stick to brace his fall against the concrete. The impact jarred the bones of his wrists and scraped his palms.

And that was it. He was hit, and he fell. The worst was over.

The messenger picked himself up and climbed back onto his bike. He had a foot on the peddle when Matt heard great, big footsteps, loud like a war drum and filled with similar intent. The man they belonged to stepped past Matt and grabbed the messenger, dragging him from his bike.

“Apologize,” Matt heard the large man say. He held the messenger down low on Matt’s level, almost making him kiss the sidewalk. “Apologize,” he said again, a grinding threat.

“I’m sorry,” the messenger said. And if the tremble of his voice did not convey his fear and confusion, his rapid heartbeat did. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

The man, Matt’s hero, picked the messenger back up and tossed him against the unyielding metal of a lamppost. It made a metallic ding and then thrumming vibrations.

“Get out of here,” the large man growled. “And look where you’re going next time.”

Matt thought once more that perhaps this was the end of it. There were many people who felt a momentary need to protect him, to coddle him.

He pushed off the ground and a strong hand— a foreign hand— reached under his arms, pulling him to his feet as though he were nothing, a doll.

“Thank you,” Matt said. He brushed the dust from his shirt and pants. He adjusted his glasses. “But you didn’t have to do that. No harm done.”

“He ran into you,” the man said, “and he didn’t apologize. I made him... accountable for his- for his actions.”

“Well, thank you again,” Matt said. He stuck his hand out, purposefully off center, as a blind man should.

“You’re... very welcome,” the man said. He shook Matt’s hand. His own was great. There was so much strength withheld behind it, Matt could tell. His touch was like the bars of a steel cage. The entity was contained, but it could still be witnessed through the spaces.

Matt let go of his hand and nudged along the sidewalk with his foot, searching.

“It seems that you were... wrong about no harm being done,” the man said. He leaned down and picked Matt’s walking stick from the sidewalk. “I’m afraid your cane has been bent, irreparably.”

Matt put his hand out, and the man moved the stick beneath his palm. He felt the unforgiving curve in thin metal. He did not need it but for appearance’s sake; however, appearances were most important in public.

“It’s no problem,” Matt assured him. “I’ll just call my friend. He’ll be happy to come and find me.” He chuckled. “Well, maybe not ‘happy,’ but he won’t mind.”

“Where were you headed?”

“Home,” Matt answered, though he was not sure he should say so to a stranger, not even one who imagined himself as a knight in shining armor. “So I’m really in no hurry. I can wait.” Matt stuck a hand out, feeling his way towards the cafe he already knew was there.

“Which way do you live?” his hero asked, following behind.

Matt nodded his head in one direction. “That way.”

The man took a gentle hold of his outstretched hand. He touched like it was a question asking for permission. Matt could feel his timid nature. He heard the way the man’s heart hammered from such chaste contact. Matt closed his fingers around the large hand, giving his consent.

“I want to make sure you... that you get home safely.” Matt could hear the pleasant smile in his words.

“You really don’t have to,” Matt said, being polite one more time. Some people could not be dissuaded from helping him.

“Let me know when we’re close.”

They began walking down the street. Matt released the man’s hand and grabbed around his arm instead. “It’s easier this way,” he said in explanation.

“Of course.”

They walked arm in arm.

“May I know your name?” he asked, and Matt could tell that doing so made him nervous.

“Matthew,” he said. “And who are you when you’re not playing at being a hero?”

“Who says I’m playing?” He pulled Matt a little closer as they crossed the street. “Wil-Wilson,” he said. “My name is Wilson.”

“Well, it’s very nice to meet you, Wilson,” Matt said, “my own personal hero for the day.”

They did not drift apart after safely reaching the other side. Wilson kept him close. Matt allowed it.

“What’s a bright young man like yourself doing in the streets in the middle of the day?” Wilson asked. “Surely you must have a very esteemed job.”

Matt shook his head with a grin. It was kind of him, respectful, to presume Matt worked like any other man. “I’m between jobs right now,” he said. “I actually just quit a very prestigious law firm.”

“Why would you do that?” he asked.

“Personal reasons,” Matt said. “But they’re boring, and I’m sure you’re only asking to be polite.” Before Wilson could quibble and push the matter, Matt turned the subject. “Tell me about you. What’s a man with cologne that expensive doing in Hell’s Kitchen in the middle of the day?”

“My cologne is expensive, is it?” Wilson chuckled but it sounded embarrassed. “I didn’t... put too much on, I hope?”

“No.” Matt shook his head. “No, I can just... smell better than most people.”

“Of course,” Wilson replied. “Of course you can. My apologies.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Matt smiled. “An above average sense of smell in New York, is... it’s good and it’s bad. But I have noticed that the higher the buildings get, the better the people smell. And you, Wilson, you are not where you’re supposed to be.”

“I was born in Hell’s Kitchen,” he confided. “For years, I was raised here.” Wilson squeezed his arm tighter as they stopped at a crosswalk. There was so much strength in those tensing muscles beneath expensive fabrics. He controlled it well. “I suppose I am... nostalgic and... sentimental towards the neighborhood.”

“I can relate to that,” Matt said. “Uh, born and raised as well.”

“I see we have much in common,” Wilson pointed out, forcing a comparison. He breathed in twice, quickly, upon realizing the obviousness in his mistake. He was flirting, or rather he was making the attempt. It was a stumbling and apparent effort, in no way suave.

“It certainly looks that way,” Matt said, throwing his hero a bone. Wilson’s awkwardness was too endearing to watch it flounder and suffocate through self-consciousness. “Don’t tell me you’re out of work too,” he jested.

“No,” Wilson laughed. He had a nice laugh, but he was too unsure of a proper duration. He cleared his throat and cut himself off. The man was embarrassed of his own enthusiasm, but Matt was enjoying the company of the gentle giant. “No, I- I... I work nights, you see. And during the day, sometimes I like to... walk the streets of my city.”

Matt stopped walking, and Wilson almost pulled him off his feet with that strong grip of his.

“This is me,” Matt said, pointing up at his building. He no longer felt that prickling unease at leading a stranger back to his home, not when the stranger was Wilson.

“I see.” Wilson relaxed his arm and untangled their hold, but he left a heavy hand on Matt’s shoulder. “I trust you can make it from here. It was very nice... to meet you.”

“Likewise.” Matt extended his hand and Wilson removed the one from his shoulder to shake it. “Thank you for seeing me home.”

“You’re very welcome,” Wilson replied. He shuffled where he stood, back and forth. Expensive shoes scraped on the gritty sidewalk as he delayed his exit. He was too reserved to take the next step he wanted, so Matt did it for him.

“Wilson?”

“Yes?”

“Would you like to come up for a drink?” Matt offered. “Coffee, if you’re not the alcohol in the middle of the day type.”

“Coffee sounds... fantastic,” Wilson said. Matt could hear the relief in him. He could sense as it relaxed the man’s posture. “I thank you, Matthew, for the invitation.”

“It’s the least I can do for my hero,” Matt insisted. He smiled and turned away to trace his hand over a brick exterior until he touched the door handle. “After you.”

If Matt thought Wilson was tense on the streets, it was nothing compared to the rigidity of him standing in the living room.

“Do you need any help?” Wilson asked as Matt walked to the kitchen to put on coffee.

“Thanks,” Matt grinned, “but I know my way around my own apartment.”

“Yes,” Wilson said. “Yes, of course you do. I apologize. You must think me so... insulting.”

“It’s all right,” Matt assured, trying to put him at ease. “A lot of people, they... underestimate what I can do. But I know you’re only trying to help. I can’t fault you your compassion.”

Wilson sat on the couch, but Matt could tell he went no further than its edge. He perched like a flighty bird. And when Matt handed him his cup of coffee, Wilson’s heart fluttered at the innocent contact of fingers brushing.

Matt had his pick of seating, but he took the other end of the small couch.

Wilson was not a master conversationalist, or if he was, nervousness paralyzed him.

“You’re so different,” Matt said, beginning a bold and intrusive conversation, “very different actually, from most other alphas I’ve met.”

Wilson paced himself with a drink of his coffee, pretending the topic did not phase him. “You can smell that as well then, can you?”

“Yes.”

“I thought I would receive no judgments for my... compassion,” he remarked.

“Your compassion would be well placed and understandable if we were dating,” Matt said. A blind omega was a jackpot to alphas, the triple cherry. To them, it was a guarantee they would always feel needed. His disability required dependency. “But we’re not. And that makes you different than those others of your gender— or perhaps just more cunning.”

“Forgive me if I overstep my bounds,” Wilson stated, “in saying that those you have consorted with are a... deplorable bunch. No man should leave a creature as unique and remarkable as yourself suspicious of a kind gesture. In no uncertain terms, they are villains.”

He was not lying. And towards Matt he seemed to have nothing but respect. Yet Matt did enjoy riling him to primal instinct. He liked catching the glimpse of an alpha who would fight for his honor, despite his own ability and track record therein.

“Wilson, do you know what afternoon delight is?”

His heart rate spiked. It pumped loudly: thump, thump. Wilson became aware of his own breathing and focused too hard to force a normal rhythm. “Se- sex,” he swallowed, “in the afternoon.”

“Like I said,” Matt continued, “I don’t have a lot going on right now. And you seem like the sort of man who can hold a guy up against the wall.” Matt could be subtle if he wanted, or he could ignore the concept completely. Wilson inspired a directness. Matt wanted to experience him without another hour of wordplay. “So how about it?”

Wilson drank the rest of his coffee in one long gulp. His throat expanded and contracted with each swallow. He set his mug on the table. That was all the answer Matt needed. He put his own cup down, still half-full but completely forsaken. He folded his glasses and placed them next to it.

The leather of the couch squeaked and groaned as Wilson crawled to Matt’s cushion and leaned over him. The man’s form was massive, and Matt could sense every rise and fall of body, every slipping, caressing fold of suit.

“Is this what you want... Matthew?” His voice was quiet and contained, but it rumbled within its containment, grinding in his throat and in his chest. His hand came close. His fingers rubbed tightly against each other before unfurling with confidence. Wilson pressed those fingers and that wide palm up against Matt’s cheek. “Is it?”

Matt turned his head and kissed the hand. “Yes.” It was a good way to blow off an afternoon. Too much time and too many women had passed since the last time he submitted to anyone.

“May I kiss you?” How respectful.

“Yes.”

It was sweet, tender, almost juvenile in its innocence. Matt knew the man was capable of more. He took the lead himself, a dominating omega. He pushed up, pressing harder into the kiss, rougher. Matt opened his mouth and Wilson gladly followed where he led. Strength seeped in. Confidence flowed. Matt surrendered control to that budding dominance. Wilson kissed heatedly and with determination. His mouth was wet. His lips were insistent and grinding. When he eased back, his teeth scraped along Matt’s lips like he wanted to bite. He was just what Matt needed.

He pulled away before going any further, before touching Matt’s body or pulling off his clothes.

Wilson found Matt’s hand and placed it against his unfamiliar face. “Do you see?” he asked. He believed in reciprocity and fair play. Wilson was a considerate man. But he was also apprehensive, as if he thought Matt would kick him out if he were not pleased by his appearance.

He waited for Matt to see him.

Normally, Matt forwent the treatment people expected, but it was what Wilson wanted. The man had to prove himself or be approved.

Matt touched.

Wilson’s eyes were closed. He exhaled and it was shaky. He inhaled and it was slow. He was nervous to be felt, even though he was the one that initiated.

There existed a rough image of people that Matt sculpted through his other, less intrusive, senses. Touch was always enlightening, however. Wilson’s head was shaved, recently shaved, and it was so smooth. Matt thought he could finger that warm, sleek skin for hours. He brought his other hand up to touch both sides of the man at once. It corralled the features he felt. It framed them. The face in his hands was tired, worn. Wilson was burdened by something, probably his job or life in general. Matt traced every slope, mapping every rise and fall, giving further dimension to what he already sensed. It enhanced the picture in his head.

“I see.”

Wilson was overwhelmingly nervous. The act was so intimate, too intimate for so casual an encounter. “And are you, uh... satisfied with what you see?”

“I think you’re handsome.” Matt pulled back the pressure of his hands. He rested them on Wilson’s face instead of using them. “But that’s not why we’re doing this. I don’t care what people look like,” he insisted, attempting to invalidate Wilson’s reservations. Truthfully, Matt did have an eye and a care for his flings, an ability that constantly confounded Foggy, but Wilson was certainly attractive enough to make the cut. “I don’t even know what I look like.” Matt had not seen himself since childhood. Despite his many abilities and perceptions, mirrors still did not work, not even for a vague outline.

“Stunning,” Wilson exhaled, answering a question Matt had not really posed. “You are... gorgeous, handsome, world’s above the casual and mundane. Please,” he asked, “take my word for it.”

“I do,” Matt said. It was flattery from a man caught up in the rush of a moment. But for that moment, Matt saw himself within the lens of infatuation, and he felt beautiful through Wilson’s eyes. “Thank you.” Matt pulled the man down and kissed him.

Wilson was not distracted by the affectionate words he gave. He recalled with perfect memory the ravaging kisses he was giving Matt. He hid it well, but he certainly was an alpha, taking control after permission.

He picked Matt off the couch in one quick, flowing movement that demonstrated proficiency of body and power. He stood. Matt wrapped his legs around Wilson’s hips and was carried.

Wilson pinned him between the heat of two windows. Light filtered in around them, blocked by the brick wall whose shadow they leaned against. Matt felt the inanimate brick on his back, cool through his shirt but rough on the fabric. Wilson pushed him against that wall, dragging him over the textured brick with every forward movement. He took all of Matt’s weight like it was nothing. He kissed passionately and pressed insistently. He trapped Matt between a rock and a hard place, as requested.

Matt kept a hand over Wilson’s shoulder and the other on his smooth head. He held it in place as Wilson began biting on his neck, hard enough to tingle but gentle enough not to leave a mark.

“You need me,” Wilson panted quietly in his ear. He pushed Matt up against the wall. He pulled. He pushed. It was the thrusting preamble of inevitable sex, more obscene than it had any right to be with them both still clothed. “You’re just a wanting omega, aren’t you, Matthew? I don’t need a heightened sense of smell to know that. You need it, don’t you, my cock?” His aptitude for dirty talk surprised Matt, but it was most definitely a good surprise.

“Yes,” he breathed over the man’s shoulder. “Yes, Wilson, please.”

Wilson pulled him off the wall. His large hands gripped Matt’s ass tight enough to leave his pants wrinkled. He walked them to the bedroom.

Matt leaned against Wilson. He kissed him. He kept his legs gripping around that stout waist.

Wilson placed Matt on the bed; he did not drop him. He began undressing himself from a very expensive suit.

Matt sat forward and pulled his shoes off. He yanked his socks and threw them on the floor. His shirt had too many buttons. He got the top few, just enough, and pulled it over his head. Matt felt hasty, naughty. It was probably a personal record for time between meeting someone and screwing them. Usually, there were a few drinks in between.

He was fumbling on his belt buckle when a hand closed over his. Wilson took over, undressing him at the finish line. Matt laid half on the bed and let Wilson remove his pants. And he did not pull on fabric, but skin. He traced his flat palms, his hard hands, over Matt’s torso. He continued to pull down, grazing Matt’s thighs, pushing the pants and underwear away in his insistent need to touch flesh. He exposed Matt’s cock but gave it no mind. He was so much more fascinated by caressing every inch of Matt’s legs. It was erotic. Wilson dragged his hands down, down, groping, taking Matt’s clothes off his thighs and over his knees. Matt raised his feet from the floor. Wilson pulled the pants off all the way. He dropped them.

Matt laid in the bed, on its edge, completely nude, exposed. Wilson watched him, and though Matt could not see, he knew he was being watched. There was such intensity in the room. The air was thick like a storm. Breath felt weighted. Wilson finished undressing and he watched Matt, watched him laying there, ready for debauchery, probably looking like he had already been through it.

Wilson’s pulse tapped erratically, spurred by attraction, by lust. Matt caught the slight heat in his cheeks and in his face. He breathed hard.

Matt spread his arms out over his head, stretching his body, tautly pulling skin over muscle and showing off every alluring rise and dip he knew was there.

The metal of a belt buckle clattered on the wooden floor. Wilson dropped his pants, finally undressed.

He was on Matt quick, grabbing his sides and pushing him up soft blankets and silk sheets, lifting him into the middle of the bed. It felt so good to be handled and moved, like Matt had no choice. He enjoyed giving up his choice, to Wilson, to the moment. It was liberating.

They kissed again. Wilson loomed over him, a heavy weight that could crush but would not. Matt had one leg on the bed and one thrown across Wilson’s back, trying to drag him further down. His arms grabbed onto the man’s shoulder and neck. One hand felt the shaved head he was so immediately fond of.

Matt pulled away, digging his head into the mattress to win a small amount of space between them. “Let me turn over,” he whispered, kissing Wilson lightly at the end. He preferred doing it from behind with men. It was not that he did not want to see them— he could not see anyone— but it felt better that way. The experience was almost animalistic.

Wilson seemed disappointed by that. Evidently, he wanted to look at Matt throughout. But he was respectful of the decision. He sat back, off Matt, and let him roll over, on his belly then up on his elbows and knees, presenting himself.

“You have bruises,” Wilson said, informing him, “bruises where the bicycle hit you. They look bad already, dark.” He sounded angry, not at Matt but at the cyclist. He regretted his lenient punishment. Wilson acted like Matt was his, his omega, and for that short time, Matt liked the possessive treatment.

“It’s nothing,” he said, assuaging such ireful emotions. “I’ve had worse. I’m... fairly accident prone.”

Wilson delicately traced the bruise on Matt’s leg. He kissed the one on his back. It was kind, sensual. He treated Matt as fragile, as if a strong wind or an unkind word would break him. Usually, Matt detested such treatment, but from Wilson it felt like nothing but a benevolent contrast to the rest of the cruel world. He kissed all over Matt’s injury, as if that lie from childhood— a kiss— would heal him. “I would protect you from it... ever happening again,” he sweetly promised.

It sounded like the beginnings of a relationship, as if he intended to be there, always, and shield Matt from the world. It was not what Matt wanted. Matt wanted something that ended within the next hour. He did not dislike Wilson, and he was not wholly unable to picture the man by his side, devoted and constant. Matt was busy though. His life, where he was, it was too busy.

Wilson put a hand over Matt’s ass, softly, gently, asking for permission once again.

“If you need lube,” Matt said, giving the consent he needed, “there’s some in the top drawer.” He pointed at his nightstand, purposefully missing the mark by a foot or so, pretending he could not see and was not certain.

Wilson pulled his ass apart with both hands. Matt felt lewd being displayed like that. He felt himself at the mercy of Wilson and his roving eyes, and he could sense those eyes and their intensity, staring at such an intimate part of him.

“I don’t think that will be necessary.”

He rubbed a finger over Matt’s hole— over, not in— and only then did Matt realize how wet he was. Clearly, he was more eager for it than he thought. It had been a while.

“Give it to me,” he asked. He moved his hips as much as Wilson’s grip would allow. “Give it to me, Wilson.”

A long finger, a thick finger, pressed against Matt. It pushed slowly inside. He moaned. He moaned on just one finger. It was like scratching an itch, like stretching an unused muscle.

“Oh, that’s so good,” he drawled. “I needed that. I—” Wilson pressed in further, all the way— “oh! Oh... I needed that.”

Wilson’s finger— that merciful, torturing finger— pumped in and out of Matt, getting him used to a feeling he had almost forgotten. Matt heard himself— not his thumping heart, not his deepening breaths. He heard the wet smacking of his ass, giving more, becoming more slick with stimulation. It sounded almost as indecent as it felt, and it felt absolutely obscene.

“Please,” he said, a vague request even he was unsure of, more of it or more beside it.

Wilson gave him another. His fingers were so thick, but Matt knew he needed it. He was out of practice, and Wilson’s cock was big, proportionately big. Matt could sense it behind him, filling with blood, hot and heavy.

“I bet you are... gorgeous when in heat,” Wilson flattered. He patted Matt’s lower back— he rubbed tenderly— as his fingers continued to penetrate and prepare.

“Wouldn’t know,” Matt grunted. “Only had a small one when- when puberty set in— oh yes, right there, Wilson— and that was... ended pretty quick with plenty of meds and Catholic shame.”

“No shame now, I hope.”

“Mm, not from this,” Matt exhaled. “Hmm!” He choked when Wilson pulled his fingers apart. “Don’t stop,” he said. “Don’t- Don’t stop.” Matt needed to remember to do this to himself more often. It was good.

“You’re very vocal,” Wilson mused, so satisfied just from hearing Matt go on and on.

“I’m sensitive,” Matt told him.

“You’re tight. You’re so tight, Matthew.”

He was, for the moment. He wanted Wilson to ruin that.

“Keep going,” he begged. “Mm, keep- keep going.” Matt was breathing erratically and they had barely begun. He always did this though. He became a whimpering mess of oversensitivity. He made a wanting fool of himself with men. It was why he did not like repeat performances. He never slept with one man twice. He could not bear the knowledge that they kept their pleading image of him. But Wilson was different. Before him, Matt did not feel judged. Instead, he was worshipped and obeyed.

Wilson gave him a third finger. It was almost too much.

“Gah,” Matt hissed. He clutched the slipping handfuls of silk sheets by his head. He rubbed his face into them, up and down against their cool surface. “Please,” he said, a mumble caught up in the mattress. “Please, I can’t.”

Wilson pulled his fingers out and Matt felt so empty, so unwantingly empty. “Do you want to stop?” Wilson asked, kindly and considerately.

“No,” Matt shook his head, mussing his hair in the sheets. “No, I mean I can’t... I can’t wait anymore. Do it,” he said. “Fuck me.”

Wilson growled in his throat, just loud enough for Matt to hear. “Of course, yes.”

Matt picked his head up to talk. “I trust you’re clean,” he said, but it was more than trust. If there were sickness, disease he would smell it. “Do you trust me?”

“Yes.” He told the truth, and somehow that blind trust was so amazing, so flattering.

“Then forget the condom.” When Matt was used, he liked to feel it: the heat, the skin, the pumping blood. “Just don’t cum inside.”

Wilson did not argue with him. Bareback felt better for everyone.

He positioned himself. Matt waited. Time slowed in anticipation. It felt like forever passed before Wilson was pulling his ass apart. At the very least, the sun should have set outside. By the time he was pushing the head against Matt’s hole, it should have been midnight. He pressed inside and Matt no longer thought of time.

They both grunted at the feeling of penetration. It was hot and tight and too much.

Wilson sounded like the wind was knocked from him. He took small, shaking breaths for concentration. Whether he wanted to prolong the sensation or take things at a pace comfortable for Matt, he went in slowly.

“You are so tight,” he panted. He came closer, nearer, laying over Matt as he pushed in further. “You are so tight. You are so hot. You are so wet. You are so wanting.”

Sheer description should not have affected Matt so deeply, but he appreciated words that appealed to his functioning senses. It made Wilson’s perspective so much easier to imagine.

“You’re so big.” Matt’s voice devolved into a whine. It was too much. Wilson’s cock, its girth, was too much. But there was no reason that should be considered a bad thing. Matt had a high pain tolerance, and the mere discomfort of the act was far outweighed by its pleasure. The scale did not flinch beneath them.

Wilson reached places no one had in years. He stretched Matt wider and deeper than any other man. No, those were boys in comparison. Wilson was a man, a real man.

“Oh!” Matt groaned, finding his voice again and nearly shouting. “Oh, you’re a big boy.” It was the only remark he could make as it was the only sensation he could focus on. The world quieted and disappeared. It receded down to the bed. It consisted of nothing but the feel in his ass: the strain, the stretch, his limit, his pleasure.

Wilson kissed the back of his neck and gave him a little more. “Wait until you feel my knot,” he spoke in Matt’s ear.

“No.” Matt shook his head. It rubbed sweat against his folded arms. “No knotting. Just sex. Just— mm... Just sex.”

“Yes,” Wilson agreed, and Matt assumed that was the end of it. He had been so respectful up until that point. A good man, a good alpha.

He rutted into Matt. He reached the end. He gave all. And then he pulled back. He thrust and he thrust, abandoning the slow pace, seeking only pleasure.

The mattress whined. The bed frame clashed against the wall. Flesh rubbed against slick flesh. Matt heard the depravity of his hole, wet and needy, so needy. It squelched on every entrance, every exit.

He was so caught up in what he heard and felt that it took him far too long to remember his own cock, hard and stressed. It swung with each of Wilson’s thrusts, a moving pendulum between his legs, aching and neglected, forgotten. He was so distracted by submission, by the demanding presence in his ass.

Matt dug his head into the bed and pulled a hand out. He wrapped it around himself. “Oh god,” he cursed, breaking so many accepted behaviors but failing hard on that third commandment. “God!” He jerked his cock for a few of Wilson’s thrusts before he had to stop. He dropped his hand back on the bed, knowing if he kept touching himself, it would be over in five seconds. He ignored his wanting erection, focusing instead— exclusively— on his ass.

The discomfort was gone, or rather, it had faded beyond mention. All Matt noticed was the enduring bliss. He could feel every millimeter of his rim as the strained skin pulled out with Wilson’s exit, clinging to the man, not wanting to let him go. Wilson fed his cock back in, and Matt felt that too, his hole pushing in on itself. He felt every sliding movement, every change of angle, every time Wilson correctly rubbed over his prostate.

It was amazing Matt could still think coherently enough to process speech.

“You feel so good,” Wilson said. “So good, Matthew. I’m almost there.”

He pushed further in, all the way until his knot rubbed against Matt’s ass, and Matt loved it so much. He loved the rounded press of that swollen flesh. He wanted it. Against his better, more knowledgeable judgment, he did. Matt often prided himself as being above those common omega desires, but it all fell apart when he was in bed. Only then did he recognize it for the lie it was. He needed an alpha as badly as any other omega, and the bigger that alpha was, the better he felt. Wilson was the biggest he had ever been with.

Wilson pushed. He was at the end, and still he pushed.

“Stop,” Matt said, suddenly serious, suddenly realizing what the man was doing. “Stop. I said stop!”

Wilson did not acknowledge him. He carried on as if he did not hear.

“Don’t, damn it!” Matt yelled at him, leaving no room to be misheard or misinterpreted. “I don’t want to get pregnant. Don’t!” He threw back a hand to slap, but Wilson grabbed his wrist. He was very strong.

“You’re not in heat.”

“That doesn’t always matter,” Matt argued. Either Wilson was that ignorant, or he expected Matt to be.

Wilson pushed again. Matt’s hole began to expand impossibly wider. Knowledge made him want to crawl away, fight his way. Primitive instinct made him want to push back and assist. Matt hesitated too long in his own dichotomy. Wilson made his decision.

“God!” Matt shouted. Something so unpleasant had no right to feel so good.

Despite himself, Matt came. He came the next second after Wilson knotted him.

Climax brought a clearer head. Matt felt betrayed. More than that insignificant emotion, he felt himself in pain. He groaned a high, whining sound. He was so full, too full. Wilson was big. Matt had all of it inside him, tip to knot. He received even more.

It was hot, what Matt could feel of that spurting, ejaculating cum. He did not want it.

“Damn it,” he cursed, speaking it into the sheets.

Wilson was still high on his own orgasm. When he came down, he laid down, and he tenderly pulled Matt onto his side with him.

They laid there for many long, dragging minutes, catching their breath, letting their skin dry.

Clarity came slower to Wilson than it did to Matt, but it did come. He sighed. It was an angry sound, directed only at himself.

“I’m sorry,” Wilson said.

“You should be.”

“I am very sorry,” he said again. It sounded genuine. His pulse was still erratic from sex and adrenaline, but Matt did not need that assessment to know he was telling the truth. “An irresponsible man, a cruel man, would blame you for it. He would say you were just too... beautiful, too tempting. And you are those things, Matthew, but this is... my fault, and I take full responsibility. I apologize... for my recklessness.”

They were nice words to let proceed such a heinous act.

“I’m on suppressants,” Matt said, quietly, mindlessly, thinking to himself. Maybe he was trying to solace Wilson, though not forgive him. “That helps. And I’ll... I can... take other steps after you leave.”

“If there’s... anything I can do to—”

“There’s not.”

Wilson did not try again. He respected Matt’s obvious wish for silence.

He took shy advantage of the proximity they were stuck inside. Surety and confidence left him. Strength was contained again, hidden and doubted again. His arm was not heavy where it rested on Matt’s side. He held up all the weight and kept it there for intimacy’s sake only. His fingertips lightly touched Matt’s stomach. They spread out until his palm laid flat. Wilson felt with powerful, tangible, suffocating intent. He was imagining Matt pregnant. He had to do it. His brain told him to. An alpha knotted inside an omega needed to think he accomplished something. The pride there was so devastatingly fragile.

Matt could tell when it was safe to move and separate. Wilson was first to address the matter, being a gentleman once more. “If you lay on your stomach,” he said, “I will... be as careful as I may.”

He got up onto his knee, and Matt rolled over on his belly. Wilson rubbed his back softly with one hand. The other parted Matt’s ass. He pulled out.

Matt hissed. The sensation was uncomfortable but manageable. If Foggy later asked why he was walking odd, it would not be a lie to say he was hit by a bike messenger.

Wilson pulled out completely and Matt felt wrecked. He was gaping with loose insides that leaked what Wilson spent and he himself produced in anticipation for it. He was thoroughly used. Be careful what you wish for, he supposed.

Matt got up without a word. He took a shower.

It lasted longer than his usual ones. Yes, he had much he felt the need to clean, but there was no denying that he was biding time, hoping Wilson would leave while he was indisposed. It would be better than an awkward parting of ways after their less than ideal circumstances.

Wilson did not leave. Matt came out of the steaming bathroom in boxers and a t-shirt, and Wilson was sitting on the couch.

“I don’t do this much,” the man said, and it sounded as though he spent Matt’s entire shower rehearsing that short sentence.

He was staring at the floor, Matt assumed. His head was looking down, but his eyes could be turned in any direction imaginable. Matt would never know.

“I don’t do this much,” he said again. For the moment, it was all he had. His rehearsal did not exceed it. Anything further had to be spoken off the cuff. “I was rash and I was... brutish. I’m afraid I’ve... that I have ruined your evening, along with whatever opinion you might have had of me.” He would not look at Matt when he spoke, too ashamed of eye contact that could not even be reciprocated. “And so I apologize to you again, Matthew, however... insufficient and arbitrary the words may sound.”

“You didn’t mean it.” Matt knew for certain. Now that Wilson’s pulse had calmed, his sincerity could be read more clearly. He was telling the truth. However, that did not make the reality of it any nicer, even if it felt amazing when it happened. And it truly was invigorating for Matt to be held down and given what he needed— though did not necessarily want. They lived in a world with consequences. Rules were put in place and enforced so those possibilities might be prevented. “But you need better control.”

“Yes.” Wilson fiddled with the sleeve of his shirt, running his fingers over and over the cufflink, grinding it within his obsessive stroke. “I tend to lose... myself,” he said, “in moments of strong emotion.” It was an excuse, but it was at least an excuse which accepted all blame. The man would make a decent Catholic.

“What’s done is done.” Matt knew better than most people that the past could not be changed, only left behind and advanced from.

Wilson stood. His steps were heavy, and every one was slow and reserved as he made his way over. It almost felt like being cornered, though Matt had no idea where the inspiration of Wilson as violent came from.

The man did nothing. There was no word nor gesture. There was certainly no violence. Wilson thought too hard with his mind while his body drowned in doubt. He did not know what to do or say in what remained of their time together. There was no good ending.

Wilson leaned forward. He tilted his head. Matt thought the angle was indicative of a kiss on the cheek. It never came. Wilson straightened back up. He put his hands behind his back, where he could trust them.

“I enjoyed our time together very much,” he said. “I enjoyed... meeting you.” Silence was preternaturally apparent, like the dead calm after fallen snow: lifeless. Wilson cleared his throat. “I’ll show myself out.”

“I’ll walk you to the door,” Matt offered, knowing his manners. Wilson let him lead. “I enjoyed meeting you as well.” It was true, however muddied the circumstances. Matt could be honest in that respect and spare the man undue suffering.

The hallway felt longer than usual, but eventually they reached its end. Matt opened the door. Wilson walked through it.

He stood in the hallway, facing in.

“I would leave my card, but...”

“I can’t read the number on it,” Matt finished for him.

“Yes.”

No further attempts were made to establish contact. Their meeting was what it was: brief and finished.

“Goodbye, Wilson.”

The man stared with what he thought was impunity. Wilson had no way of knowing the position of his head could be seen, his focus noticed. He was looking at Matt’s face and tracing every line into remembrance. “Goodbye, Matthew.”

Matt shut the door slowly.

He knew Wilson stood out in the hall longer than acceptable. He heard the man when he did leave. He heard Wilson cursing at himself. He heard every word of self-degradation. He heard Wilson hit the brick wall and its caked layers of plaster, no doubt injuring his hand.

Then, eventually, Wilson faded from hearing and into memory.

Matt dressed and went back out.

There was no discreet way to purchase the morning after pill when Matt had to ask the pharmacist to find it for him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Parts... of this are sweet, aren’t they? I wanted to build up their interaction here so the fall is greater. I love a good contrast. Mostly I’m an “under different circumstances” shipper. Especially for them.
> 
> Well, there’s more to come. Like the actual mpreg part. Because the only contraception that’s 100% effective is keeping a nickel between your knees, kids.
> 
> I would like to point out that Stick said Matt has silk sheets, but literally every time I see his bed they’re cotton. I wasn’t sure which to mention, but silk stands out to me as making sense so I went with it.
> 
> Please let me know what you think so far.


	2. The Warehouse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Such a positive reception after one chapter. Thank you all very much. Thank you commenters, kudo givers, and silent lurkers. I’ve never had such an immediate rush after posting something before. Clearly we are all in agreement that we need some Fisk/Matt in our lives. Supply too low for this demand. Only now I feel the pressure. Haha. Hope I don’t disappoint. 
> 
> This chapter is very short, so I’m uploading the next one along with it.
> 
> 1.09 “Speak of the Devil” is fun if you pretend they’ve previously had sex and then meet again in the art gallery. No really. Matt’s angry because he knows who Fisk is now. But for some reason, Fisk has this fond, dazed, distracted expression. Sadly, I will be skipping that scene. Because it’s basically the same, except some sentences may now have dual meanings. (“I’ve heard about all you work in Hell’s Kitchen.” - “I’m aware of yours as well.” Hah.) But you should go watch it and pretend.
> 
> Question. I know it’s a small ship, but I haven’t seen a name for it. May I call it DevilKing? Just a suggestion.

Fisk held him by the throat with both hands, making Matt’s own body weight choke himself. The concrete column behind his head halted any retreat, and he could only add an inability to breathe to his copious, gushing injuries.

“I know your body,” Fisk growled. “I know your voice.” He was quiet but close. “I’ve heard it... begging.” He tore off Matt’s mask and threw it to the ground. Fisk was so sure of himself, and yet he still gasped to be proven right. “Hello, Matthew.”

He pried his thick fingers from Matt’s throat and threw him onto a desk. Matt broke the surface in half with his body. Papers stuck to the wet blood of his back. He inhaled. The room smelled of burning flesh.

“Take him,” Fisk instructed. Matt caught his breath and used it to fuel his whimpers of pain. “He’s coming with us.”

“That’s it?” Fisk’s second-in-command, Wesley, questioned. “You’re not going to kill him?”

“The man is blind,” Fisk replied. His handkerchief snapped and fluttered as he took it out to wipe the sharp smell of blood from under his nose.

“Murdock,” Wesley observed after a better look. He understood Fisk’s fascination.

“I want to know how he does the things he’s capable of.”

A man approached. Matt could barely hold himself off the floor, but he crawled onto his knees and found a loose pipe with his fingers. He threw it between his assailant’s eyes, but the man was loyally persevering. He fell to the ground and grabbed Matt’s legs before he could flee. His grip was so tight and Matt kicked with any strength left. Every movement pumped blood from his body and onto the floor.

A gun cocked. It was aimed at his head.

“Wesley,” Fisk warned.

The gun moved slightly, a few degrees. It pointed instead at Matt’s arm. The odds were small that a shot to the arm would be fatal. It was simply a threat for further pain.

“Take him,” Fisk ordered again.

Wesley approached with calculated footsteps, evenly spaced like a metronome. He kept his gun on Matt until the very last second when he turned it around and beat him in the head with it.

 


	3. Bound

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The timeline in DD (season one) is very vague. Distances in time are rarely, if ever, mentioned. Therefore, I can do whatever the hell I want and no one can stop me.

Pain.

Utter pain.

Debilitating pain so horrific it clouded the very memory of what it meant to be whole.

Matt was in a bed. No blanket was over him, only a sheet. It was as rough and grating as the one below. However, the sensation of those cheap cotton sheets was nothing compared to the fresh agony of two consecutive fights— and no pain medication for it. Matt could barely focus on his surroundings to observe where he was, to see where he was.

The floor was concrete, cold and flat. Sound rippled. It was thick. The walls were painted brick, a bright color though indistinguishable to him, probably white. The ceiling lights were harsh. Their long, fluorescent bulbs hummed like an annoying insect. The room itself was roughly twelve feet wide and fifteen long. It was a good place to stash someone. The thick cage welded around the door was a good way to keep them there.

Matt was not alone. And his gasping whine of realization to agony gave away his conscious state.

“I didn’t recognize your voice on the radio that night,” Fisk said. He had been waiting to say it. “When we spoke, when you were holed up with the Russian and we...” He elaborated only halfway, stopping in the middle. They both knew what he meant. “Too poor a quality, I suppose, too much static. Did you recognize me?”

For a moment, Matt did not answer. One syllable felt too hard to utter and too much information to give. He took a breath and the movement showed a spotlight on his many injuries. He inhaled more shallow.

“Yes.”

At first, and a long time after, Matt dismissed the name Wilson as coincidence. He never even suspected it could be the same man. It was the radio call between them which made him realize.

Fisk was quiet. He was thinking. Matt began no conversation of his own. He had no desire to talk, not in his current state and not with his current company.

“Two more... inches to the left,” Fisk eventually said, somber and contemplative, “and you would be dead. Not from Nobu’s blade, no. Not from that injury. You would be dead because the only thing keeping you... alive... would be gone, wasted.” Matt did not comprehend. Fisk saw his cluelessness and understood— assumed he understood— its cause. “You’re pregnant.”

Matt feebly shook his head. “No.”

“Ten weeks, they say. It... coincides with the day that we... with that afternoon.”

“No.” Matt felt sick. He felt dread. He felt powerful denial.

“It is my child,” Fisk declared. “Mine!” He stepped forward in his rage, asserting his claim through volume and proximity. He was close, four feet from Matt’s bed. His feet dragged to a standstill. Control was lost but reclaimed. Fisk calmed himself a minuscule amount. He did not yell, but he was still angry, bitter, and resentful. “I would... ask how you didn’t notice something so severe, but I believe you’ve been very busy playing hero. And our child— my child— it hides well inside all of that... muscle.” Matt would not talk. Fisk spoke at him. “You’re holding my child hostage,” he said. “Inside of you, you’re... you’re keeping it from me, committing foolish risks that will hurt it, take it away.” He stopped and composed himself again, restraining his emotions. “So I, in turn, shall hold you hostage for the duration, to keep my child safe.”

Matt shook his head. “I’m not,” he rasped, “I’m not pregnant.”

“No, you are,” Fisk stated. “They ran tests on your blood, under my orders. I was... curious how you accomplish the things you do while- while blind. Some sort of enhancing drug.”

“No,” Matt said defeatedly.

“No, it’s not,” Fisk agreed. “But for now, that is a question for another day. For now, my top priority is your health... for the baby’s sake.”

“It’s not yours,” Matt lied. “I took the pill... after you left. If I’m pregnant, it’s... it’s somebody else’s. I am— I’m pretty damn promiscuous after all... Or did you not think it odd that we were having sex within half an hour of meeting?” He had slept with no one else since. He was a busy man those days.

“Perhaps that is true,” Fisk said, “perhaps. But I have no reason to trust you anymore, do I?” He shuffled where he stood. The soles of his shoes pulled across the smooth concrete floor. “So until such a time that we may tell one way or the other, you will remain... here. And since I recall you as a man of faith, I would suggest you pray. Yes, pray that the child is mine. Because after all of the difficulty you have caused me, Matthew, it’s the only thing keeping you alive.”

A child. Pregnancy. Fisk had no reason to lie.

Matt should have noticed. It was a reckless thing to miss, but shortcomings and weaknesses were what they were for a reason. He oftentimes had trouble picking up on matters without the knowledge or expectation to concentrate on them. Focus was everything, and if he had looked— if some suspicion had possessed him to look— he might have seen it. Any other time, Matt knew his body and its every small function inside and out. He tried looking now, but there was too much in the way. Pain shrouded him in dense fog.

He blamed himself. He blamed distraction. He blamed gradual growth, that trickery which played him. One day held such little progress over its predecessor. If time were not so linear, Matt liked to think he could distinguish between Day 1 and where he was. He would see it clearly. But pregnancies were not so abrupt.

He was pregnant. He missed any signs. His life was spared because of it.

What a cursed blessing.

“So what, you’re just going to keep me here,” Matt asked, “forever?”

“No,” Fisk answered. “No, not... forever. Thirty weeks, I’m told, and that is how long you will remain. After that, you have no... purpose. After that, I will kill you and make my own life much more simple.”

“I don’t really... I don’t care for the accommodations if it’s a thirty week stay,” Matt said, trying to be argumentative.

“You’re not meant to.” Fisk had not intentionally made Matt’s situation miserable, but neither had he gone out of his way to make it anything more than livable.

“How do you know I won’t choke myself, kill myself?” Matt asked. “Hang myself with the bedsheets to get away from you?”

“Because,” Fisk arrogantly answered, “you are too... proud to kill yourself, especially if you still think there’s a way out. And I know you will spend the next seven months convinced you’ll come up with one.”

Matt did not reply. It was true after all, but he would not give Fisk the satisfaction or peace of mind from confirmation. Matt waited for him to leave.

He did not. Fisk lingered in the room, observing his prisoner. The loudest sound between them was Matt’s labored, irregular breath.

“You’re in pain,” Fisk said, an obvious assessment.

“Yes.” There was no benefit from acting tough, from lying.

“I made certain your wounds were properly treated to prevent infection,” Fisk told him. “But the pain itself...”

“I’m meant to suffer,” Matt said, knowing his punishment. “It’s what I get. Serves me right. Is that it?”

“You could end it, end your suffering,” Fisk generously offered. “I could have the drug of your choice here in... minutes.”

“And the price?” Matt inquired, knowing there was one, curious of just how steep it ran.

“How do you perform the feats you do while blind? What do your friends know of my operation? What have you told them? Do you or they have any hard evidence hidden away?” He paused, and Matt thought that was all he had to ask. His hesitancy betrayed just how important the last question was to him. “Is the child mine? Answer... any of these questions, answer them truthfully, and I guarantee you one full day of medication, at least. You have my word.”

“Your word?” Matt chuckled, but his ribs hurt. His stomach twitched around its stitches.

“Far more trustworthy than yours,” he said. “I never lied to you.”

“Neither did I,” Matt insisted. “We only spoke on the... surface. It’s easy to avoid the truth when no questions are asked.”

“Answer mine now.”

Matt swallowed. He took stunted breaths, but even those pushed on the ripped skin of his chest and abdomen. A reprieve, however slight, sounded euphoric. But obstinacy sounded better still. “I’ve had worse,” he said. It was a lie. Matt laid on his rock bottom.

Fisk laughed. It was chilling. “Have you now?” He walked closer. “How much worse, I wonder.” He passed the bandage on Matt’s stomach and instead pressed his large finger into the one on his breast.

Matt screamed through clenched teeth and closed lips. The pressure of Fisk’s finger pushed in on severed flesh. It pulled on the stitches of sewn skin. Matt screamed until he ran out of the breath to sustain it.

Fisk took his hand away and Matt could smell his own blood go with it, sticking to the fingertip. The gauze over the wound was wet. His stitches would need to be resewn.

Matt inhaled hard through his nose. Even that hurt. He no sooner caught his breath that Fisk got him on the other side, pressing mercilessly into the mirrored injury. He screamed and he tried to push the hand away, but he was weak. Fisk stabbed deeper to quell his fight. The finger dug inside.

“Stop!” Matt shouted when he could take no more, the pain upon pain.

Fisk eased up, but he did not remove his finger. It rested featherlight against the reopened wound.

Matt answered the question most beneficial to him and those he cared about. “My friends don’t... They don’t know anything,” he panted. “They’re innocent. I worked alone... to protect them.” Fisk’s hand pulled away. He wiped the blood on the sheet that covered Matt. “But that’s all I’m telling you.”

Fisk seemed pleased enough with the small surrender. “You’ll tell me the rest,” he was so sure of himself, “in time.”

He took a few steps back, keeping an eye on Matt, then he turned around.

Matt listened for the exit protocol. Fisk had a key in the inside pocket of his jacket, not one that could be easily stolen from. He unlocked the big steel gate, loud and metallic like the prison door it was. It swung heavily on three hinges. Each one shrieked. The gate closed. It was locked. Fisk turned in the small cage and knocked on the room door— four times, though the number may have been arbitrary. A small piece of metal slid inside the door, a peephole. The person on the other side let him out. They locked the door behind Fisk.

The system sounded simplistic but impenetrable. That was the point. Matt was dangerous, or he would eventually be again. They took appropriate caution.

He would find a way out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Boo. The old locked up prisoner cliché. I apologize to anyone who was perhaps hoping there would be some freeborn plot out in the real world. Come on though. After meeting face-to-face, Fisk would know. If Elektra can recognize Matt’s ass, why not Fisk? Haha. So yes, Matt held prisoner. I will try and make it up to you all with really great character interaction and development. To me, that’s the point of this fic: Matt/Fisk interacting. Not plot, not really.
> 
> Also I like thinking about Matt’s cold, heavy realization during the walkie-talkie conversation in this universe. His heart must have jumped into his throat when he asked whom he was speaking with and Fisk said, “I think you know.” And that long pause before he first answers Fisk's calls, just listening to the voice, recognizing. Mm. Yes. And then even as he realizes that Fisk doesn’t know it’s him, he still knows it’s Fisk/Wilson. That is some heavy information to take in. But, once again, I skipped writing that scene because it’s basically the same. Matt’s simply suffering a slight panic attack and disgust while it’s going on. You slept with the enemy, Murdock!


	4. Surroundings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is so booooooring. So I’m uploading the next one with it. But don’t get used to this. From now on it’s one chapter at a time. And they’re pretty short, averaging 1k. But sometimes they’re longer. My current goal is to update once a week. Don’t hold me to that.

Fisk was honor-bound to give one full day of medication, even though Matt only spoke to forgo torture. Whatever they gave him— for he had no preference— did not stop his pain, but it dulled the sharpened edge. He was able to get out of bed.

The dimensions of the room were as he suspected. It was a long rectangle. Three walls were solid brick with no gaps; he was not missing out on anything there. The fourth housed the door, so of course he was restrained from the full length of it.

Matt examined the cage around the exit. It was five feet by four and went all the way to the ceiling. He felt each welded intersection. Some were weaker than others and covered by less solder, but all joints were beyond his ability to break barehanded. Long screws disappeared into the wall, anchoring the cage. Matt could not make it budge, nor could he get his fingers around the screws and twist them. He made a note to try again when he could exert more strength.

There was a shower on one wall, and Matt considered the only reason he did not sense it sooner was because it had not been used in ages. When he turned the faucet, water came slowly, then quickly. It smelled like pure rust, but eventually it became clearer, decent. The foul water went down the drain, washed away by the clean. The shower itself was odd as it had no walls, only a dip in the floor around the drain. Matt suspected it was more for decontamination than bathing, greatly modified to fit its new purpose. He was in some old science lab, or at least he guessed he was.

There was a toilet that fed off the shower’s plumbing from a small hole in the wall. Matt doubted it was an original fixture. It was added afterward, for him or for anyone else who might involuntarily rent the space.

That was it: a full-sized bed, a shower, a toilet, three walls he could touch completely, and one he could not. There was no camera, or if there was, Matt could not tell. He could scarcely believe his right to privacy.

The room was not cold, but Matt’s only shirt was a patchwork of bandages so it felt that way. His pants were from his costume, what he had worn to the warehouse. His shirt was gone— ruined and discarded. Therefore, feeling cold, feeling tired, feeling his curiosity temporarily met, Matt laid back down in the bed and covered up with the coarse sheet.

+

Three times a day the door opened and food was brought in. A tray was set on the floor of the cage and pushed through a hole. The small gap in the metalwork was five inches high, eighteen inches wide, and not big enough to be any help.

The meals themselves were healthy, though not very flavorful or gourmet. The portions never left him wanting. Given that the objective was to keep him in the best condition possible, Matt was not surprised by the lone generosity.

He did not know who brought the food, only that they were strangers, men he had never met. The person changed every few days. Matt was certain they were unimportant lackeys, drawing either the short straw or the long one, depending on how they viewed the job. Matt did not speak to them, nor they to him. They were non-entities, a service more than a person. It was obvious they would not risk their own wellbeing to help him, and Matt did not waste everyone’s time in asking. He remembered the terror Fisk burned into those beneath him. He remembered the consequences of something so banal as saying the man’s name. To free his prisoner was to open a door to every horror that could be conceived and every one that existed outside the inconceivable.

A small box was left for him with necessities: three sets of clothes, a towel, soap, shampoo, toilet paper, a toothbrush, toothpaste, and a razor— electric, no blade. It kept his stubble down, but it snagged on the hair and pulled his skin unpleasantly.

Matt kept track of time by the meals. The medicine wore off after the first few. With nothing more to do, he meditated, facilitating his own recovery as much as he could, as much as sheer mental determination could.

For three-and-a-half days, all was uneventful. On the fourth, he became sick, nauseous. Retching put unwanted strain on his stitches. It felt unending.

“Morning sickness,” Matt assumed, talking to himself. He sat beside the toilet, sipping on a cup of water. Pregnancy was never a matter he researched in depth; when he needed to know, he would look it up. It felt late for the symptom to appear though, even by his own inadequate knowledge. “Pills,” he thought, “suppressants, four days and they’re out of my system. Hormones…” He rested his head against the cold brick wall. “Hormones change, correct themselves.” It was undoubtedly ill-advised for someone to remain on suppressants while pregnant. That did not change the fact that he missed them, not if they meant a disruption of his current sickness.

Nausea was not the only symptom of his withdrawal. It took another three days before Matt realized that.


	5. Withdrawal

Matt came to his senses all at once, as if his head had been dipped in a sink of cold water. He took a deep inhale. Everything was sore. He felt hot. The room was stuffy. The air was wet. The weight on the bed was heavy. The breath in his ear was loud.

“What happened?” he asked. His voice was strained, the rasping aftermath of shouting. He was laying on his left side, up off that deepest, most severe cut in his belly.

Fisk pulled his hips back, making Matt even more aware of the knot stuck inside him. “They say it was like a heat,” he explained. “Hormones or something... Something crossed the wires. Not even your own body knows what to do with you.”

“What... happened?” he repeated through clenched teeth. He could not remember anything. The spit in his mouth was thick.

“My first order was to sedate you before you hurt yourself.”

“Before I hurt the baby,” Matt corrected.

“Yes, of course,” Fisk confirmed. “But you were still such an insistent... greedy... boy.” He spat the words with insult, ridiculing Matt. “So I obliged you.”

“And just how long did you wait before... obliging?”

“Oh, far, far too long by your count,” he answered. His voice rumbled with perverse delight, reaping joy from how he represented the scene, knowing Matt could not knowledgeably contradict anything. “While you may have once been a very large thorn in my side, you are still a... weak omega under my care. And so I have taken care of you.”

“You can leave now,” Matt said. “I’m thinking clearly again.”

“No, I think I’ll stay.” Fisk moved back several inches, pulling on Matt, dragging him. “I’ll stay for another ten minutes at least.”

Matt could have moved in the opposite direction, uncoupling himself from Fisk, but not only was an early separation painful, he had no guarantee the man would not hold him down and force himself back inside.

“How do I know you didn’t induce this?” Matt asked instead. It was a fair question.

“Because I want... _nothing_  to do with this rebellious, deceitful body of yours, not after all the setbacks it has caused me.” He put a large hand on Matt’s shoulder and traced it down his arm. When he reached the end, Fisk grabbed his wrist, squeezing painfully tight. His smallest finger scratched at a cut on Matt’s forearm. “And yet I would kill anyone else who tried to touch you in my stead.” Matt did not doubt the threat.

“Am I supposed to be flattered?” he scoffed.

“You are allowed to experience whichever emotion you see fit,” Fisk said. “Bask in one of your few remaining freedoms.”

Matt hated Fisk’s mockeries and the attention he brought to inescapable imprisonment. He took pride in having Matt caged. It was victory over an opponent. It was dominance over an omega. Matt was prisoner. He was spoils.

They did not speak any more. They did not want to. Bantering pillow talk was beyond them, and words of disdain did nothing but waste breath. The feelings were known. There was no necessary reason to voice them.

When Fisk was done, he pushed Matt, tilting him over, facilitating an easier exit for himself. He was, however, very mindful of where he put his hands. Matt’s injuries were numerous. They were serious. They were everywhere.

“Damn it, damn it, damn—” Matt whined when Fisk pulled out. He was a very large alpha.

They were done. Whatever they had been forced to endure together was finished.

Fisk sat on the bedside for a moment. When he moved, it was from the realization that showing his back to an enemy was ill-advised. He did not remember it well enough as he dressed. Matt could not see him, but Fisk still fell to the human instinct of privacy and shame.

There was a short row of nails sticking out from the wall. Matt had been using them to hang his spare clothes. Fisk’s shirt and suit were on them now. Matt’s things were in the floor.

Fisk dressed. With his back to Matt, he dressed.

The thing about superhuman hearing was that it made Matt very good at sneaking up on people. Bare feet on solid concrete helped.

He jumped up and got Fisk around the throat right before the man turned. Matt tightened his arm. He squeezed.

Fisk gasped for air, but he kept a level head. He grabbed at Matt’s arm with both his hands. Matt did not let go. He would not. Fisk moved backwards. He slammed Matt into the wall, crushing him. He did it again, and again, and again.

Blood was in the air. The cuts on Matt’s back were open again. The gravest one in his stomach was pushing its stitches like a feeble dam in a storm.

He let go.

Matt slid down the wall disoriented, but he moved in time to avoid Fisk’s fist. He ducked down and hit the man in the stomach. He got another jab in. Before he could go for a third or even move away, Fisk grabbed him. He picked Matt up under his arms. He lifted him from the floor. Fisk yelled and threw Matt up against the wall. The bones of his shoulders were jarred in their immobile setting. His head banged against the brick. Matt was naked and in pain. He was in poor shape for a fight. But he was motivated.

He kicked Fisk three times, twice in the stomach and once in his chest. Fisk fell back, and Matt was dropped onto the floor. He leapt forward to assault his foe, but he was struck down by an unexpected and horrible attack.

Fisk clapped Matt’s head between his hands, his large, strong hands. He hit Matt’s ears, creating a vacuum that incapacitated, that left his head reeling. Fisk knew how to hurt him now. He knew Matt’s strengths, which meant he knew his weaknesses.

Matt lost hearing, and his vision was halved. The world was reduced to what he could feel, smell, and taste. Even that was distracted by the pain and the dizziness in his head. He fell to the ground, on his knees, clutching at his ears. He was guaranteed to throw up, but he kept the need down, for a moment.

Fisk could have left. He should have left, marching off under the crown of victory. He stayed, standing on the spot, remaining until Matt could hear again.

The world came back slowly. It was full of static, like he was adjusting the antenna on an old television. He saw bits and pieces.

“I’m curious what the rest of your plan was.”

Matt heard that.

“I didn’t have one,” he admitted. “I just wanted to make you hurt.”

“These are the actions I spoke of, those which make you a poor and... reckless carrier for my child. This is why you must be kept against your will, for the safety of you both.”

“You would’ve... You would have been disappointed if I didn’t at least try,” Matt reasoned.

“Perhaps, yes,” Fisk agreed. “But the attempt has been made, the situation met. There is no reason you should try a second time. Purge yourself now of these hopeless ideations. I do not... want to hurt you.”

“Yeah,” Matt said, “you do. Just not while I’m pregnant.”

“I am not a cruel man.” He spoke as if he had to prove the point, to make his case against the accusation— and to Matt of all people.

“I say this...” Matt took a breath, feeling dazed and sick. He gagged, but he swallowed the impulse that came with it. “And when I say this, I say... it as a good attorney supported by fact: all evidence to the contrary.”

“This is not a courtroom,” Fisk stated. “And I do not care about whatever it is you have to say.”

“No,” Matt disagreed, seeing Fisk a little better now, knowing his twisted, corrupt mind better from that one assertion he uttered, that one demand for understanding, the demand to not be regarded as a monster. Fisk showed his hand. “No. I think you are on trial, or you imagine yourself to be. And you want to... prove that you’re innocent, justified.”

Fisk did not reply for a long while. Matt knelt impatiently in the floor, trying to not be sick and ruin any intimidation he still inspired.

“Not to you.”

Fisk left.

Matt threw up. He would have to block that attack better in the future.


	6. Chronic

It kept happening. Not often, but every few weeks Matt’s body would start up a weak, temporary heat. It was bad enough that he always called out for Fisk.

The first time— second time— was the worst. Matt was stubborn. They drugged him before, but he was within his right mind when it came around again. He told himself he would handle it. He told himself he would sooner die than ask for help. Matt said this at the beginning, when pride was present and resolve was untested. Heat was a trial he would pass and pass alone.

But Matt did not know heat. Twice realized, never remembered, that fever driven Hell. The inauguration of his adolescence was faded through, being half a lifetime ago. He could scarcely recall what it felt like, only that it happened and was promptly ended. His first heat from adulthood was taken from him. It was a cloud of blank memory. Some people accomplished it alone; that was all he needed to know. And he was stronger than most people.

Matt laid on the bed, bending his body in a way that would have hurt a few weeks prior. He had one hand desperately rubbing his cock, trying to reach a level and a release he never would alone. His other hand was inside his ass, stretching himself on three fingers, pushing them in as far as he could. He went to four.

He was ambitiously working up to his fist when lunch was dropped off. Which meant the delivery boy had a very profane view when Matt shouted, “Fisk!” at him.

Time was incalculable, but Matt knew it took too long until Fisk finally showed up. He opened the door and sniffed, smelling Matt, confirming it was not a meeting for meeting’s sake. He said a word to someone in the hall and stepped fully inside. The door shut and the room sealed them in together. Fisk came to his bedside.

“Help,” Matt mindlessly begged. The skin of his cock felt raw, and he finally let it go at the possibility of actual release. He could not stop his fingers, wet and slippery, making horrible noises and achieving nothing. “I need... Mm, I need...”

“Finish it,” Fisk demanded.

“I need... I need,” Matt panted, “you. Do it.”

“Say please.”

“No.” Matt shook his head, digging it into the pillow. “Your breathing is... labored. Your blood is rushing. Your face is hot. You couldn’t leave now if you wanted.”

Fisk growled under the scrutiny of their stalemate. He undressed purposefully slow. He watched Matt suffer while he did.

Matt’s clothes were dropped on the floor once again so Fisk could hang his up.

“Turn over.”

Matt rolled onto his knees without argument. He may have been blind, but he did not want it face to face either.

Fisk dug a knee into the bed and climbed in behind him. He grabbed Matt around the wrist and pulled his fingers out of himself. He threw the hand down onto the bed. Matt felt so empty, and he rocked back and forth in want.

It was his first full heat, or rather, it was the first one he could remember having. He was sharing it with Wilson Fisk.

“Do it,” he said. “Do it. Get it over with, you son of a bitch.”

The hands on his ass felt cool in comparison to his own fevered skin. Fisk pulled him apart. “I see you’re more than ready for me.” The taunt cut deeper than it should have. Matt did not like being ridiculed for matters beyond his control, and especially not for that.

“Come on,” he urged, pushing back. He was held still. Fisk was eager, though he hid it much better. He slid in slowly, a tease that strung Matt out on a groan until breath quit him and he took another. “Mm,” he whimpered. “Do it. Hard.”

Fisk did not need any direction past that. There was no buildup. There were no questions of concern nor monitor of wellbeing. He thrust hard into Matt without comment. It was almost painful. Fisk knocked him forward with strength, and Matt would have retreated from the merciless penetration if he did not need it so badly.

They moved up the bed, little at a time, until eventually Matt was up and with his chest pinned against the wall. It was cold and hard, but smooth with repeated layers of thick, glossy paint. Fisk pressed Matt’s wrists into the brick and rutted inside him.

Matt’s sounds were between pleasure and discomfort, frustration and hatred. He needed it, but he did not want it. Fisk thought the same. The noises in Matt’s ears were angered grunts and growls.

They were stuck in that cycle and scrambling for an end they welcomed. The sex repeated, slowing or quickening for added stimulation. The sounds were the same, those neanderthal utterances devoid of words, over and over. Sensation and hearing did not stray from that loop. Scent did not exist outside sex and Fisk.

It felt good. It felt like exactly what he needed. Matt hated that it was.

Fisk pulled him off the wall at the end. He grabbed Matt by his hair and threw him back into the bed. His knot came with no warning, no gentle nudges. One push and he forced himself inside without sympathy. Matt yelled, but he was too relieved by his orgasm to focus on the invasive stretch.

“Bastard,” he whispered, too out of breath and energy to say more.

Matt did not want to embrace or even be near each other, but the bed was small for two grown men and their options were finite. Fisk did not seem to like it either. He did as required. He moved them around until he could lay on his side with Matt in front of him. They rested at the end of the bed with their feet up against the wall. Matt could still feel his body heat in the brick.

Their gasps became pants became breaths.

“This shouldn’t be happening.” Matt only knew the standard basics, and within them was the common knowledge that pregnancy’s one positive trait was a break from heats and suppressants. “This isn’t right.”

Fisk did not comment. If he had an explanation, he would not give it to Matt. If he did not know why it was happening, he owed Matt no concern.

“It can’t be good for the baby.”

“It’s sex,” Fisk said. “It can’t be bad for it.”

“Sex, huh?” Matt replied. “And what about the woman you’re dating?” he cruelly inquired. “From the art gallery, Vanessa, what does she think about this?”

“She doesn’t know about you,” Fisk said. “And you will... not mention her again.” It was a command and spoken like a threat. Matt wondered at the consequences, what further injustices Fisk could possibly inflict upon him.

“You know,” he continued arrogantly, “I’m curious what you’ll tell her in... six months.” Fisk’s hand twitched at his side. “Adoption maybe. You have her fooled enough to believe you’re really that magnanimous. Or maybe,” he laughed for the sake of impact, “maybe she’s as... duplicitous as you. Maybe you don’t lie to her at all. Maybe you’ll tell her the truth and she won’t care. You’ll raise the baby together without a second thought to what it cost.”

Fisk’s retaliation was silent and swift, faster than anything anticipated. He did not force Matt down and pummel him for his impudence. He snatched Matt’s wrist. His hand closed. It squeezed. Fingers dug into tender, unguarded flesh. They tightened without regard to the intricacies of bone beneath. Discomfort slipped into pain.

“Stop,” Matt said. Fisk bent his wrist, adding a bowing curve to the pressure he exerted. “Stop.” Matt heard the silent snap of minute damage. He jerked and fought against the man, but the hold on him was an unmoving anchor. “Stop, stop, stop! Fisk!”

Fisk held on for three seconds more. He eased up but did not let go. He kept Matt’s wrist between his fingers without gripping or squeezing.

There was no second warning about Vanessa. The point was made without words. There were many ways Fisk could hurt Matt without further depreciating his quality of life or injuring the baby.

“She isn’t like us,” Fisk said. “She isn’t... dirty for necessity’s sake.”

“My friends are the same,” Matt asserted. “And I can’t protect them in here, like this, so just... leave them alone. They’re innocent. Leave them alone, and I won’t mention her again.” As a show of good faith, Matt did not even speak Vanessa’s name.

“Your leverage is minuscule,” Fisk said.

“You have no reason to hurt them,” Matt reasoned.

“And that is the only reason why I won’t.”

It was something, however small. “Thank you.” Matt relaxed as much as he could around Fisk. He sighed and conformed to that large body behind him.

“You’re welcome.” Despite it all, Fisk still had some small amount of respect for Matt, and it was that respect which kept his focus narrowed. There was no need for casualties in their war.

Fisk leaned his head forward and bit Matt’s neck, digging in hard and leaving marks all along a circling trail. His fingers curled and twitched around Matt’s tortured wrist. He put a long, heavy leg over Matt’s own to keep them in place.

“What do I look like to you?” he asked between rough bites. “I know that you can’t... see me, not as I see you, so I wonder what it is you do see.”

When Matt did not reply, Fisk bit hard on the muscle between his neck and shoulder. “Pain,” Matt answered honestly. “Pain and... heat. Expensive cologne. Whatever cleaner your laundromat uses. Violence... shapes you physically, like red smoke in a glass container, filling every curve and corner.”

“But you didn’t see that before,” Fisk said. “Before when we... when we were together, you didn’t see it then.”

“No.” He had been careless to miss it. “My mistake.” Fisk’s nature contradicted itself, violence against timidity, and each side hid the other well, until he had need of it.

“I’m a complicated man,” Fisk said. “You weren’t wrong about what you saw before. You simply... missed everything else beneath it.”

“I believe the man I met that day would let me go,” Matt said. “He knows this isn’t right. How do you shut him up so effectively?”

Fisk’s lips closed over his teeth. He kissed Matt’s shoulder instead of biting it. “That man, that aspect of who I am, listens to me because I am stronger, and because without me he would have nothing. He is grateful to receive what I allow him to have.”

“I wouldn’t mind having a child with him,” Matt said. It was a lie, but there was no reason not to tell it. If he could play the man against his own insecurities, Matt thought he could maybe work the situation to some advantage.

“Then it is unfortunate,” Fisk said. He let go of Matt’s aching wrist and pulled his gentle lips away. “It is unfortunate that you will not have one with either of me. Make no mistake, Matthew, I still intend to kill you when you have finished creating my child for me.”

For a moment, they did not speak. Promises of death snuffed want of conversation. They lay with skin touching, sweat mingling, and the end of sex tolerated. Each of them wanted to be with anyone other than whom they were with.

“Can I...” Matt was not sure where the question came from, perhaps a remnant of the state his mind had been in not ten minutes prior. He felt weak and pleading. “Can I hold the baby before then,” he asked, “before you kill me?”

“I can think of no greater torture or insult than to deny an omega the right to their child,” Fisk said thoughtfully, kindly, “however brief that one moment between them might be.” His voice went deep, a horrible, cruel snarl. “So no, Matthew. No, you may not... hold the baby. You may live long enough to hear its cry, to know what you may not have, and then... I will kill you.”

“You’re despicable,” Matt said, disgusted by the man’s horrid denials.

“You forced my hand,” Fisk defended of himself. He sounded genuinely upset that Matt drove him to what he must do. “You should have kept your head down like any other sensible person. You should have joined me if you couldn’t. I once liked the docile little omega I met. I admired the sentiment of the man in the mask. I do not look forward to killing either of them but especially not the first... even if he was a lie.”

“Then if you have to,” Matt said, “if I’ve forced you into doing this, I just ask that you kill me wearing the mask of the man I met, that... kind alpha.”

“He’s not strong enough to kill you.”

“I only need him to be strong enough to save me from a violent end by your hands,” Matt said. “Is he strong enough to give me that, to help me?”

“I... I don’t know.”

Matt made Fisk think. He made Fisk’s mind live out the judgment he gave, not just speak it. Words were weaker than reality. Matt inspired unpleasantness. Fisk did not like Matt for what he did. He did not like being shown his ineptitude, no matter which side of his personality was weak. Matt embarrassed him.

When he was able, Fisk got up from bed quickly. He dressed quickly. He reasserted power immediately.

“You will not delay in asking for help again,” Fisk told Matt. “You will alert someone the moment you feel the need arising.”

“You’re just jealous because your man got a look,” Matt claimed.

Fisk did not deny it. He loathed Matt, but in his mind he still possessed him. He did not share well. “You will tell someone.”

If they were making demands at each other, Matt had one of his own. “I need something for nausea,” he said, hating to ask. “I can... barely keep anything down, so you can’t say no. I’ll get sick— sicker— without eating. You don’t want that.”

Fisk was averse to give in to anything Matt wanted. But he knew there was a line where argumentation jeopardized everything. “Very well,” he relented. “I’ll look into it.”

He took the key to the cage from his pocket.

“Would you turn the light off?” Matt requested. The switch was beside the door and just beyond the reach of his arm. “I don’t need it, and the noise it makes is... maddening, to say the least.”

Fisk hesitated. It was a kindness to comply, though it cost him nothing to give. He thought about it.

He opened the cage and stepped inside. He knocked on the door, and it was opened for him. Again, he hesitated.

He left the light on. But that contemplation, those seconds of inaction, signified something.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A couple paragraphs from this chapter are the very first bits I wrote for this fic. And that was about a year ago, a few months after season one premiered. I have been sitting on this fic for a while. I never thought I'd actually write it.


	7. Demon Seed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think we’ve all seen our share of Stockholm Syndrome in fic. Not that I don’t love it. But I thought it’d be nice to instead have fun with the rarely used and very delicate Lima Syndrome. Well, it’s what this fic ended up being anyway. The thing wrote itself. I didn’t set out with Lima Syndrome in mind, but I quickly realized that’s what it needed to be.
> 
> Not calling anyone or any child a demon, but I did find the lyrics to Nine Inch Nails’s ‘Demon Seed’ to be apropos.

Time gentled Fisk.

Not in his words or his overall treatment. But his actions became less violent. Matt’s pregnancy became noticeable. Fisk could not follow the act of looking at it with that of causing physical harm. He thought of his child, if not the vessel for it.

He touched Matt’s stomach while they lay knotted. The small mound of it, barely risen, was eclipsed by Fisk’s wide palm. His arm was heavy where it rested on Matt’s side. His hand pushed in harder than he must have thought, unmindful of his own strength, or unable to overcome his hatred at Matt for the sake of what was inside.

“I wonder if you can feel it now,” Fisk said, murmuring it like a thought, phrasing it as though he were not posing a question at all. He was not looking for an answer. He was merely pondering aloud.

“Yes,” Matt told him anyway. He rarely had the chance to talk. Even a conversation with Fisk was better than the dead weight of silence. “I couldn’t ignore it now if I wanted.” He had a stomach, and its presence, however small, would not be denied. “But I’ve been able to... sense it for awhile, ever since I knew to look.”

“What is it that you sense?” Fisk asked, forgetting himself in curiosity and fascination.

“A heartbeat,” Matt answered, “small, quiet, a flutter.” He wanted to touch his stomach, but Fisk’s hand was in the way. He would not place his on top or beside. “There’s more. I feel more when I put my hand over it,” he said. “There are these, uh... little movements I pick up, what my fingertips feel. There’s no internal sensation, not yet. And I doubt if you’re able to feel anything from the outside, so I don’t know what you’re doing.”

It was possession, cut and dry. They both knew it. Fisk did not remove his hand. He was not embarrassed by Matt’s claim of futility.

“A heartbeat,” he said.

“A small one,” Matt reiterated, “barely there, barely... formed.”

Fisk was too distracted by the thought to hear Matt’s grounding remarks. A heartbeat meant life, and it was a greater, more endearing confirmation than however many tests were ran or however many inches Matt’s stomach grew.

Matt’s thoughts were of a similar vein. When he first listened to that tiny heart, he had accepted the pregnancy. There were no more fantastical denials that Fisk played some horrid joke on him.

“I didn’t know I was pregnant,” he said. His voice was very hushed, his manner oddly guilty. “I drank. I even had something hard that night. Before I went to the warehouse, I was... mourning Mrs. Cardenas, the woman you had killed.” He hated having to admit it to Fisk, but the thought had been weighing on him. “I know how risky that can sometimes be when pregnant.”

“I assumed you drank,” Fisk said, “as most young people do.” He had already factored in the possibility. “But there have been no adverse symptoms, not yet. I... encourage you to speak up if any present.” What an odd sentence, hanging so close to being classified as a request, knowing Matt would oppose an order out of sheer defiance.

“I’ve never been pregnant before,” Matt reminded. He laughed. “How the hell am I supposed to know what isn’t normal?”

Fisk did not answer. There was nothing for it except admitting to the disadvantages of keeping Matt locked up.

They finished. Matt was not through his heat, and so they went again. He considered there to be nothing worse than two rounds. Any possible conversation got used up on the first go, and the second time they knotted always drowned in tense silence.

Fisk was quick to get out of bed, but he was slow to dress. He now made a point of keeping his attention focused and his eyes on Matt. He would not be snuck up on again. He put each of his layers on with consideration instead of haste.

“I need something,” Matt said from the bed, covered only in that rough sheet.

“No,” Fisk denied.

“I haven’t asked yet.”

“No all the same.”

“I need something to do,” Matt insisted. “It’s... monotonous being stuck down here with nothing. Give me something, books... please.”

The final word caught Fisk’s attention, but it did not sway him. “Do I look like the sort of man who has books written in Braille lying about?”

“They’re not hard to find,” Matt told him. “And you are resourceful.”

“No.”

Fisk shrugged into his jacket and buttoned it.

“I was nine,” Matt said, speaking quietly at first, then raising his voice. If the answer was not heard, saying it was useless. “It was a car crash. I... pushed a man out of the way. Took a hit for it.” Matt never regretted his choice. He would do it again. “The truck was carrying chemicals. They spilled and they- they splashed in my eyes, blinding me.” Fisk did not speak, but Matt knew he was listening. “But as for what made this possible, why I can hear and smell and feel, taste... so much more than other people... I can’t answer your question. Because I don’t know.”

Fisk contemplated his options. Strictly speaking, Matt had given him nothing. But it was a power play to make him say it. Fisk still undeniably had the upper hand. Making Matt do or say something he did not want was submission in the presence of that knowledge. Matt forsook his pride. He let Fisk win a battle.

“And the child,” he asked, “is the child mine?”

“I answered one of your questions,” Matt said, “but I won’t answer all of them, especially not that one... Because you don’t believe me when I tell you no.”

“You’re a liar,” Fisk reminded himself, “never to be trusted.”

He left, and he turned the lights off when he went. Matt doubted if he noticed the gesture.

The next morning, a very, very large pile of books was slid in beside Matt’s breakfast. The first few he touched were pregnancy books. He feared a loophole and mockery. But there were treasures around them, classics and other works of a thought provoking, time consuming nature.


	8. Field Trip

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would like to apologize that this fic is, well, sort of boring. There’s not much in the way of plot, you see, but there are small bursts of it. Sometimes the monotony changes, like in this chapter. But mostly it is a very slow and gradual build between two characters. I wouldn’t say it’s like trying to get back to before all of their unpleasantness. They can’t just forget they hate each other. So it’s not as good as the day they met, but it’s not as bad as the initial realization. They have to find a middle ground, which is better in a way. All honesty, no secrets. But getting there is, yes, boring and slow. Sorry.

Matt woke when he did not want to. But the malaise upon his body was unnatural, imposed, and that alerted his mind, groggy as it was.

He was in a different room. It was smaller, ten by ten feet maybe. There were no windows, but it was still nicer and newer than his cell. He was in a separate building entirely. They sedated Matt to move him.

Fisk was there, in the corner. He was sitting in a chair and waiting for something.

“Tell me, should I suspect all my food of being drugged from now on?” Matt inquired. His mouth was dry.

“Even if it is,” Fisk replied, answering so casually, “you can’t stop eating, so your suspicions prevent nothing.”

“I think I’ll remember the taste now that I know it.” His food had been a little off, but since he had no basis for comparison, he dismissed it.

“There are less... kind ways to sedate you,” Fisk threatened.

“I could have walked,” Matt said.

“I hardly trust you off a leash.”

Matt rattled the handcuffs that secured him to either side of a bed, a bed with rails. “Why am I here?”

“You are here only from, uh, necessity,” Fisk told him. Clearly, the baby was the guest of honor. Matt was along for the ride. “You weren’t supposed to be awake for any of it.”

“I have a high tolerance for drugs,” Matt stated. Somehow, it felt like winning an argument.

“So you do,” Fisk agreed. “And now I give you the chance to be quiet at your own discretion.”

Matt did not know what that meant— a gag or more drugs— but neither did he want to find out. He kept obediently silent, for the moment.

There was electrical equipment in the room. The contributive smells of cleanliness and chemicals led Matt to the obvious assessment that he was in a doctor’s office, though not necessarily a nice one. It was not in an area where an unconscious man being carried around went noticed or fretted over.

“An ultrasound?” Matt presumed.

“Quiet,” Fisk reiterated, but Matt felt he was too complacent to silence him without good cause.

They waited in the room.

Fisk sighed heavily and tapped his foot loudly. He was impatient, like a child.

There was a presence, a man, outside, two doors down. He spoke with a female omega, a pregnant female omega. Matt assumed he and Fisk were waiting on the man, the doctor. He assumed that any attempt to shout out for help from the women would end badly for them both. He would not risk her safety.

The woman left. She walked through a waiting room inhabited by two— no, three— of Fisk’s men.

The doctor wasted no time in seeing to them. He knocked on the door and entered. “I’m sorry,” he said. “That was my last patient of the day, and she wouldn’t leave. I’m sorry.”

Fisk said nothing. He did not forgive the man nor yell at him. Silence could oftentimes be more frightening than anger.

“I’ll just— Oh!” the man exclaimed. “He’s awake.”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Fisk said. “But he shouldn’t give you any trouble.”

The doctor’s heart rate was erratic. He was afraid of Matt, chained as he was. Or maybe he was made uneasy by the situation, that his patient was a man held against his will. He was more honest, perhaps, than his benefactor. He was dishonest enough to take the money.

“Of course.” The man cleared his throat and fidgeted where he stood, still trying to find the courage to proceed. Fisk was intimidating incentive.

“Get on with it,” he ordered. “I don’t have all night.”

Matt waited patiently in the bed as the doctor hopped to action. He put on gloves— latex by the smell— and they snapped around his wrists when released. He approached the bed.

“Uh, I’m just going to...” He pulled down a thin blanket and lifted Matt’s shirt. His hands prodded roughly, pressing into Matt’s stomach from all angles. “Good,” he said out loud, maintaining small verbal observations, unable to cleanly transition from his normal patients to one he should have ignored. “Everything feels good there.”

Fisk nodded his head but was silent.

“I need to...” The doctor coughed. “He needs to put his legs up in the...” Screws whined at the end of Matt’s bed as the man rocked the stirrups there.

“I’m not doing that,” Matt denied. There was a line he had to draw.

“Matthew,” Fisk commanded, “do as he says.” He was irritated and embarrassed by Matt’s recalcitrance. He was, essentially, an alpha who could not control his omega in public. Disgracing him felt good. “I will,” he warned, “have you restrained, or sedated.” He did not want to carry through with it. The effort involved was too much.

Matt gave in. He did not bow to the threat. He simply acknowledged the need to comply. There were no irrelevant aspects of an exam, or if there were, the doctor surely skipped them. Matt did what was asked of him. He did what was needed. After all, he did want to know the baby was healthy.

Matt knocked his blanket aside. He situated himself further down the bed and raised his legs into the stirrups. As predicted, it was embarrassing, more so than wondering who took his pants and underwear. Considering the man’s jealous nature, it was probably Fisk. In fact, he was barely keeping it together just letting the doctor look and touch. Matt could hear his uneven breaths and feel his heated cheeks. He all but growled. He was so possessive, an alpha despite his sometimes contradictory nature.

The exam was not as bad as Matt feared. It was bizarre more than anything, being touched like that with such clinical disinterest. It was a stark difference to mindless, animalistic heats with Fisk. The doctor was professional, if greedy and spineless.

Matt was very glad when they were done and he could put his legs back down and under the blanket. He hoped there would be no repeat any time soon.

“So I’ll just...” The doctor gestured aimlessly. He was nervous. He was made uneasy by Matt. He was scared of Fisk. They were no doubt the worst parents in his practice, however unofficial their enrollment. “It can be a bit cold,” he warned before squirting gel on Matt’s stomach. “The warmers, they really don’t do enough.” He stopped talking to Matt again. Fisk must have been glaring at him.

He brought the cart over. Wheels rolled. Three of them were fine, but one was matted with hair and dust. It dragged across the linoleum floor.

A switch was pressed. The machine on the tabletop hummed. There began a continuous screech at a very high frequency, but it was fairly quiet and easy to ignore.

The doctor said nothing. He gave up talking to them outside of what was required. The transducer on Matt’s stomach contributed to the many foreign sensations of the day. It searched until it found what it was looking for.

It was the same heartbeat Matt had been hearing, delayed now by half a second. He heard it in stereo: thump in his ears, then thump on the machine, over and over. It was a good sound, a comforting sound.

“There’s your,” the doctor cleared his throat, “baby.” He must have known Matt was blind, or he had noticed it by now. So pointing at the image on the monitor was for the benefit of one.

Fisk leaned forward and studied the small fetus he was seeing. It was nothing but static charge and a dim frequency of light to Matt, but Fisk saw something that fascinated him. He was excited, more so within than what he displayed. Matt was always good at picking up the hidden emotions.

“I know last time we looked,” the doctor spoke up, “you said that ten weeks was the- the timeline you were anticipating. He’s at about... seventeen weeks now, so it still fits there.”

“Good,” Fisk said. Matt got to live a little longer. He would always pass though. It was Fisk’s child. Matt knew that and Fisk suspected it, but he would never be certain until the end, not unless Matt told him— which he would not do.

“Everything looks healthy,” the doctor told them.

“And the sex,” Fisk asked, “the sex of the- of the child, what is it?”

The wand moved around on Matt’s stomach, searching for the best angle. “It’s so hard to tell at this stage. We’d have to be very lucky. Perhaps if you come back in a few weeks we can…” He stopped talking. Transporting Matt was not something done on a whim. Taking the doctor to his prison cell did not appear to be an option either. The man tried harder to appease his employer. “I can’t… I can’t say for certain,” he murmured, “but right now it looks like it could be… a boy. Yes,” he decided, changing his opinion to a certainty, “it’s a boy.”

“A boy,” Fisk repeated. His great chest filled with air. He sighed with elation. “A- A boy. And you’re,” he cleared his throat, “you’re sure?”

“W- Well,” the doctor stammered. His heart beat louder, quicker. “We never have a 100% guarantee until they’re here.” He was backtracking, giving himself an out, lest he be wrong. “But for now, that is what it looks like.”

Fisk nodded, content enough with the answer. He did not hear doubt. He was thinking about his future son.

“Doctor,” Matt addressed, businesslike and impersonal. His talking still managed to make the man exceptionally nervous. “I seem to be going into heat every... Well, the first time took almost three weeks. Now it’s less than two. I was wondering about the cause and any adverse effects it might have.”

“H- How long do they last?” he asked.

“An hour maybe, long enough for a round or—”

“Quiet,” Fisk interrupted. “I told you not to speak.” It went without saying that Matt swung his second strike. The only reason Fisk let him speak as long as he did was because the question needed to be asked. But that did not mean the answer was for them both. Fisk would hear it himself, later. “And you,” he told the doctor, “do not talk to him.”

“Yes, sir, Mister...” He was wise enough not to say Fisk’s name. Even after the man’s outing to the public, questionable practices were not something he wanted his name tied to. Stakes were higher. Matt wanted to ruin him.

Fisk never left them alone. Matt was unable to influence the doctor’s ambivalence over the whole matter.

The two of them stepped out of the room together, but first Fisk unlocked one of Matt’s cuffs. “Get dressed,” he said, and he did not spare one second for Matt to pretend he did not know his pants were in a chair against the wall, just within reach.

Matt dressed with one hand. He did not hear Fisk have a conversation with the doctor. The man was smart enough by now to have it later or write it out. He knew too much about Matt’s abilities.

There was no knock. The door opened five minutes after Fisk left, almost exactly five minutes. It gave Matt more than enough time to get dressed. But mostly it ensured that the man who entered did not see anything he was not allowed to.

He had a gun on Matt, a precaution he thought would save him. The real mistake came when he stepped close enough to stick Matt with a syringe.

His gun was knocked into the air after a kick to the hand, barefoot but still strong. Matt caught the weapon. He had little experience with guns, but he knew that pointing and shooting at his remaining handcuff did not have a wide margin of error.

Matt fought with the man, and while he deserved a raise for his efforts, it was hardly a challenge to subdue and grab him around the throat. Matt pressed the gun to his head.

“Walk.”

There was a back door, but it was locked with the late hour. Matt pushed his hostage towards a staircase instead, hoping he could go up a floor and use the fire escape.

“You try anything,” Matt threatened, “and I shoot you.”

“No. You won’t,” Fisk said, calling his bluff, risking the life of a nameless employee. “You don’t kill.”

Matt turned to face him. “Try me.” He had enough on the line to test his morals. God might even forgive him.

“Your gunshot,” Fisk said, “it will have the police on their way. And while there are those on the force in a position to cause delays, we do not have time to... discuss this. We both know how it ends.”

“I know how you _think_  it ends,” Matt sneered.

There were more guns— two— pointed at Matt, but Fisk waved them off. Shooting was not an option. He was needed alive. Even flesh wounds were too big of a risk.

“Release the man,” Fisk said, “and put down the gun. I think we can agree they’re useless to you.”

Matt could not shoot a man who was nothing more than an obstacle. Fisk was right. Matt shoved him away. He raised the gun, pointing it at Fisk with more precision than was expected of him. The threat was taken seriously. Matt had a reason to kill Fisk. He had many.

“You’re going to shoot me?” Fisk questioned, surprised.

“Just beating you there,” Matt replied. It was what Fisk had in mind for him after all.

“I thought you were more... honorable than this.” He took a step forward, risking his own life. “Lay down the gun. Fight me like a man. You even have me at a... disadvantage,” he said. “You know that I cannot kill you. You know that there are only so many areas I can attack without harming the child.”

They were both handicapped. Pregnancy was Matt’s advantage and his disadvantage. He was not used to fighting while four months pregnant.

“Tell your men to leave,” Matt demanded, “and the doctor.” He knew Fisk himself would not go. Matt did not waste his breath with the order. “Tell them to lock themselves outside.”

Fisk took a deep breath. He was angry to be controlled, but for once Matt had the upper hand. He surrendered. “Go,” he told his men. “Do as he says.”

They left. One man ushered the doctor along with them. A key was tossed on the waiting room floor. It was sealed inside with them once the door was locked.

“The gun,” Fisk prompted.

Matt’s hand trembled with rage. “I really... really want to kill you.” It was the least someone as despicable as Fisk deserved.

“Show me how badly you want it.”

The gun shook within Matt’s fleeting control. He let go. It clattered on the floor. He was honorable, like Fisk said, but mostly? Mostly he just wanted to tear the man apart with his hands.

He ran forward. The first few hits were his alone. Fisk was too distracted trying to find a safe body part to hit or grab. Matt punched him in the head and kidneys with months of now unfettered fury. He remembered every weak spot he ever learned in fighting.

Retaliation came slowly, and for a moment, Matt considered his pregnancy a bigger favor than a hindrance. Fisk could not knock him down. He could not hit Matt in the stomach or anywhere near it. He found his strategy eventually.

His first move was to strike Matt against the ears once more. After all, it worked so well for him last time. Matt anticipated the attack, however. He knew Fisk would use it. He evaded the clap.

Matt tried for another hit of his own, but Fisk caught his wrist and held like a bear trap. Technically, he won. Matt was restrained once more. But loss of one limb did not stop the assault of another. With his left hand, Matt pummeled the man in the head, quickly and repeatedly. Fisk staggered back and released him.

Matt kept his hands up like a boxer, ready to strike or to defend. When Fisk came at him again, Matt ducked beneath his arm. He punched Fisk in the side and got behind him. He kicked, and the man almost went down, almost.

Fisk recovered, and he swiftly rounded on Matt. He got a hand on the back of Matt’s neck, squeezing, restraining. There was no escaping the hits to his face, three in quick succession. Then Fisk hit Matt in the chest, hard and fast and again. He let go with his other hand and gave one more attack, open handed but devastating. It knocked Matt on the floor and left him wheezing. He could not breathe.

Fisk touched the side of his shaved head and drew back blood, a small amount. He approached. Matt could barely get a decent swallow of air into his lungs. Escaping or retaliating was something akin to fantasy. He kicked, but his leg was easily pushed away.

Fisk picked him up. He dragged Matt onto his feet and put an arm around his throat. Matt pulled on the arm. He scratched at the man’s face. Fisk squeezed, and Matt’s vision turned spotty. He held on, and Matt’s mind disassociated.

“I won’t... hold this against you,” Fisk promised, speaking it into his ear.

Matt awoke, however many hours later, with new injuries, a sore chest, and a throbbing head. He was back in his prison cell.


	9. Alone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a very brief and nothing chapter, so I’m uploading the next one along with it.

Matt did not ask for Fisk’s help when next he went into heat. He wanted nothing more to do with the man. He preferred suffering over association.

It hit him.

He said nothing to the person who brought him lunch.

He barely held it together when that lightly eaten lunch was exchanged for his dinner, but he kept the impulse down. Matt sentenced himself to a heat alone.

He did not remember much.

For a few hours, he kept a level head. After that, it swiftly devolved into the longest night of his life. It was a night where hours grew up like walls that caged him from relief. It was a night of frustration and maddening want.

He cried. He yelled. At one point, he begged. But no one guarded him around the clock. There were better uses for a man than having him sit outside an inescapable prison.

“Fisk!” Matt screamed. He clung to the bars of the cage and rattled it. “Fisk! Fisk, you son of a bitch! Fisk!”

He wanted it to end.

After the first hour of nonstop shouting, Matt’s voice went hoarse. The raw, straining irritation did not distract him from the rest.

He sat in the shower and let ice cold water envelop him. It helped the fever of his skin but nothing else.

Matt was reminded of his childhood when he contracted chickenpox. The itching— the horrible, incessant itching— was all he could think about, but he could not scratch. As much as he wanted to, he could not. Scratching would make it worse, he was told. He was given no choice other than to suffer, to falsely pretend he could think of other things.

He meditated as best he could, persuading his mind to take power over his body, but his thoughts were so distracted. His hands were so restless. His body was too energized.

After that, cognizance faded in and out.

Matt experienced the sensation of being blackout drunk, an aspiration he left behind in college and law school. The night flickered. He caught glimpses. Most was a black gap in time.

It ebbed.

It stopped. An hour before dawn, two hours before his breakfast, it stopped.

Matt cried with relief and gratitude. He laid in bed and did not move one muscle. He was exhausted. Everything was sore and overused. It was worse than the aftermath of some new exercise routine that worked his whole body and granted no time for rest. He was abused.

His ass hurt, and there was no telling what he did to himself that he could not remember. There was so much. He fucked himself on anything. None of it helped. It was not a knot. It was not an alpha. It was not Fisk, the bastard.

Matt laid in bed until after his breakfast was brought and his untouched dinner was taken away. He idly wondered if his eating habits were reported to Fisk.

The water was hot when he showered again. Anything to help how sore his muscles were from tensing and contorting.

Out of concern for his child, Matt checked himself as best he could, attentive to whatever he did while in heat. He was bleeding, but it was minimal, mostly finished and healed. The baby still moved. Its heartbeat was regularly paced. Matt did not worry.

Hunger made him eat.

Fatigue made him lay down.

Matt could not do it again, especially not in two short weeks— less than really. He could not. He would ask for Fisk.


	10. Business as Usual

Fisk was not stupid. He could certainly count. He noticed the disruption in their schedule. He knew a round of sex went unfulfilled. He knew what Matt did.

“Don’t do that again, Matthew,” he said when he arrived, when a heat had come again.

Matt wondered if Fisk’s pride was hurt by knowing he was not needed. If it was, the feeling of uselessness was surely undone by Matt calling him back.

“Spare me the lecture.”

Fisk had sworn he would disregard the event at the doctor’s office, and yet he fucked like it was a vendetta. His hands abused skin, gripping it, pinching it between his fingers and the hard bone of Matt’s hip. His pacing was erratic and far less for satisfaction than punishment.

“I hate you.” Matt pushed the words through clenched teeth. His eyes drew tightly closed. “Oh god, I hate... I hate you.” He opened his mouth and bit his own arm.

There was no indication Fisk heard him, not until the end, not until he pushed himself inside. He laid over Matt’s back and caught his breath, and between those gasping inhales came the words, “The feeling is... mutual.”

They laid down on their sides, Matt’s back against Fisk’s front, as was their habit.

“This happens to some people,” Matt said, still feeling that overwhelming need to occupy dead air while knotted. “They react badly to going off suppressants, to being pregnant. There’s a different set of medications to treat it.”

“Did you learn that from one of your books?” Fisk asked.

“Yes,” Matt answered, “in between Freud and Thoreau. I needed something scientific and palatable after being reminded of what he had to say about omegas.”

“And what... makes you think you’ve done anything to deserve this reprieve, this medication?”

“It’s an inconvenience to you,” Matt rationalized, “always having to come down here and help me.”

“You assume that I’ve hidden you far away.”

“Unless we’re in the basement of your apartment,” Matt said, “I’m not worth the trouble. They’ll get closer together near the end. It could be every day unless... you get me the medicine.”

Fisk thought about it. He rolled each option back and forth. “I like you this way,” he decided, “all... compliant and submissive, at my mercy. If I give you too many advantages, you’ll think you have... leverage... over me.”

“It’s a request,” Matt said, “not a negotiation. You still hold the cards, Fisk.” It was not a loss to admit to it. Fisk was in control. Matt simply acknowledge that. “Helping me isn’t showing weakness. It’s compassion.”

“‘Compassion,’” Fisk sneered. “Yes, I remember your relationship with the word. What was it you said, hmm? What was it? My... compassion would be understandable if we were dating. That is how you view compassion, isn’t it, Matthew? Yes, I believe with you it must have excuses or... motive.” Fisk put a hand on Matt’s shoulder and rubbed. He dug into the skin and the muscle. It was some mockery of a massage, leaving discomfort and not relaxation. “But we are not dating, no. I would not sully the concept with what I do to you. Therefore, an exchange,” he said, “tit for tat. To show Matthew Murdock compassion is to want something from him. You need to sweeten the pot with more than my... convenience.”

Fisk had something in mind, and Matt knew what it was: his only asset. He asked anyway, laying himself beneath a fool’s hope that it was something else, something of lesser value. “What do you want?”

“The child,” Fisk asked, as he always asked, “is it mine?”

“No,” Matt lied, as he always lied. “So maybe you should go ahead and kill me.” He did not want his child raised by Fisk. He did not want his child indoctrinated into the world Fisk would create.

“You know I won’t,” the man replied. “I will keep you... alive until the day your falsehood is exposed. I will make you watch as I am proven right.” His hatred and his disbelief of everything Matt said made his suspicion escalate to surety. He would not be dissuaded. Fisk waited to be correct about the child. Matt hated that he would be.


	11. Lawyers for Hire

“You hired us on purpose, didn’t you?” Matt asked. It was a question of rhetoric. He was mostly sure and had almost convinced himself of it completely. “When your man, Wesley, hired us to represent John Healy, you knew who I was.” Fisk would not say, but silence was confirmation. “You did your homework— extensively. Lawyer named Matthew, in his late twenties, blind, recently quit a prominent law firm, and I’m sure you pulled a picture. You knew who I was when you hired us. Why? And don’t say it was about keeping tabs on Karen. You’d already dismissed her as irrelevant. It’s why she survived the Union Allied purge, the one where you killed off your own employees.”

Fisk did not answer immediately. Matt thought he never would, not that it was expected.

“You had no clients,” he said, “none of worth, none that would... keep your new practice from folding in on itself.”

“I’m supposed to believe you did it, what, out of the goodness of your heart?” Matt scoffed.

“Yes,” he said. “But believe what you will.”

“I didn’t _need_  your charity.”

“And yet you cashed the check.”

The comment made Matt feel cheap, bought. He was pitied in the past and taunted for it in the present. Sympathy and financial aid were bad enough. The knowledge that his benefactor was a man he slept with, a man who saw it as a favor, wounded Matt worse. He could not resent the source of the money any greater. Its ill-gotten origins had never been a secret. But to be funded with it under the motive of obligation after intimacy made him regret ever having cashed it.

“It was a bad move on your part,” he criticized, trying to reclaim some manner of esteem. “The case put you on my radar. And it was how I learned your name.”

“At the time, it was nothing more than a... generosity,” Fisk said. “I couldn’t have known to suspect you or what your, uh, small involvement would reap.”

“Meaning you underestimated me,” Matt insinuated.

“And for that I apologize.” He was utterly sincere. Many people underestimated Matt, and he let them keep the fragile picture. Fisk had broken through the illusion, forcefully, and he was truly sorry for ever having dismissed Matt as powerless simply because he could not see.

Matt did not accept the apology, nor did he give thanks for it. “How do you do it?” he instead questioned. “You can be good, Fisk, respectful. You can be ca... You can be... caring. How does a man like that condone the evils you do?”

“People in this city have been trying to change it since its inception, to help those who needed help. But whether it is the attentions of those poor themselves or the funding of those looking to promote their own public image, so little is ever truly changed. It is revolution, Matthew, but at a size so small it might only change the life of one individual. It never... It never shifts the status quo. You would be satisfied answering every distress minuscule enough to come over a police scanner. I believe you would be. I am not. I am not satisfied. I brought down the Russians. Is that not enough to justify what I do? I broke my ties to the Japanese and with your assistance crippled them. Is that not enough? You see, unlike you, I genuinely want to change this city. And so I will. If I must sully myself to make that happen, so be it. You could not remain idle. Neither could I. ‘Sometimes history takes things into its own hands.’”

“That’s, uh,” Matt recognized the words, “that’s Thurgood Marshall.”

“An inspiration in a time when the people were too complacent and too callous to act in their own best interest,” Fisk said, “a man who refused to wait for someone else to create the change he wanted.”

“You like lawyers,” Matt questioned, “justices, men who create and uphold the law?” He found it ironic.

“I admire men who made a difference on a... grand scale.”

“But you pick and choose,” Matt accused. “You can respect a man as long he doesn’t speak or behave in a way you find... inconveniencing, contradicting. You can’t... quote Thurgood only when it applies, Fisk. You can’t stand behind one ideology and ignore the rest. Or did you stop reading? Did you stop before he said that, ‘When we intend to do good, we do. When we intend to do harm, it happens’? You can’t wave the banner of a man who’d see you as intentional harm.”

“I do not ignore what he said,” Fisk asserted. “I use it. I do good, Matthew, when I may, when I am able. I do harm when I must. You think the words apply to separate men, a saint and a villain. I regret to inform you that real men, those outside of words, are rarely so simple. I do not... pick and choose between what I find meaningful, applicable. I must instead decide on how I will proceed and how my decisions will affect dozens... hundreds... thousands. For this I use reason. Intent is meaningless. It is a consequence. And while I do not intend these unpleasant consequences you accuse me of, I anticipate them. I knew they were coming. I am not proud of everything I have done, but I do not regret the decisions I made. I would make them again.” The shame he claimed was in his voice when he said, “I will make them again.”

Matt snickered. “It goes with the mindset, doesn’t it?” he said. “You know what’s best, and you’re incapable of being wrong. No one gets a say in their own lives, in these lives you swear you’re trying to protect.”

“How typical we are then,” Fisk replied. “You would protect them and nurture them. You coddle these people when they are adults who make their own choices.” He paused, drawing on old thought. “The way you operate, your focus on children, on women, the elderly, anyone weaker, I should have... known the Man in the Mask was an omega.”

“Maybe,” Matt allowed. “Or maybe just someone with a conscience.” They could argue with each other all day, all night, every day until Matt’s life ended. It was an endless debate, and while each one could submit logic he found flawless, it would fall on deaf ears. They did not want to listen to each other. They only wanted to talk, and now that was played out.

They were near their end, with Fisk’s knot nearly spent. Matt moved his leg with the stiffness of twenty minutes and one posture. There were not many alternative ways to lay.

“You know,” he said, trying for casual, “one day I’d like to have a conversation where I’m not trying— unsuccessfully trying— to ignore the fact I’m being fucked.”

“I have neither the... time nor the- nor the want to entertain,” Fisk responded. “Neither do I have the temperament, not with you.”

“Yeah,” Matt agreed. He certainly would not want to speak with Fisk if there were alternatives. But for Matt, there were none. He spoke with Fisk, only Fisk. The raging silence in between those times made Matt wait for them, though he knew it was not a thing worthy of anticipation. “Yeah, I was just... commenting.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In my constant rewatch of Matt/Fisk scenes and also thinking about my fic, I arrived, again, at the end of 1.09. And there’s that part (about 50 minutes in) where Fisk talks about Matt’s emotional weakness for children and women. His expression softens and he almost appears guilty as he looks Matt up and down. I love it. He starts off so authoritative and arrogant. Then he begins looking down at the floor and making excuses. And in this universe, I like to pretend that’s the moment when he realized it was Matt. Still beats him up though. Haha.
> 
> Another thing to think about that’s slightly different (or has different emotions/motivations) in this universe. Wesley going to their office to meet with and hire them. His odd amusement towards Matt’s stubbornness now has a separate reason. I suppose he would be intrigued, trying to see what Fisk saw in Matt and kind of getting it. But then at the end of that arc, Fisk met and became enamored with Vanessa. So he decided to forget and move on from Matt, letting a brief fixation go. But then they met again in that warehouse and well...


	12. Aversion

Fisk visited when Matt was not in heat. It was unexpected. He remained inside the cage, however, refusing to unlock it and enter a room where Matt was within his right mind. He did not speak. He would not shout across the room. Matt understood that after a moment. He got up and went to Fisk. Three feet of air, one inch of steel, and ten more seconds of silence were between them.

“You’re not eating,” Fisk said. “I’ve been told that you’re not- you’re not eating.” How horribly frustrating for the man to make a trip that had no purpose other than to converse with the prisoner, as no employee could do in his stead. “If this is some manner of protest,” he insulted, “it is a childish one.”

“I’m still eating,” Matt refuted, “everything except for some types of chicken. I can’t... It, uh, I can’t stomach it. I don’t like thinking about it. And the smell... when it sits there on the floor for hours, it makes me sick.” His morning sickness had expired before the end of the pills Fisk gave him for it. That symptom was behind him. There was only one remedy for his current malady. It was the most obvious solution: a departure from stubbornness. “I tell your men not to bother leaving it, but they take a certain... delight in doing the opposite of what I want.”

Fisk silently contemplated the matter. “You may request a different food,” he allowed.

“I wasn’t aware there was a menu,” Matt scoffed. It was the response Fisk expected. They each played back and forth, one unsure of how much to give, the other unsure of what he could ask for. If there were a precedent for their situation, it did not exist within either of their lives. They were new to it and uncertain in it.

“You need to eat,” Fisk said. The matter was settled. He turned to go.

“I’m curious what a hunger strike would have gotten me,” Matt spoke, thinking of how its very possibility got Fisk’s attention.

“Nothing,” Fisk asserted.

He was lying, or Matt thought he was. It was hard to tell with certain people on certain subjects. “You didn’t come down here to call me a child,” Matt ascertained. “You came to negotiate.”

“Even if that were true,” Fisk said, “the subject is now moot. Your victory lies in choosing what you eat. Congratulations. Enjoy the luxury.” His hand raised to knock on the outside door. Again, Matt pulled him back in.

“You’re worried now,” he said. “You are. You realize that you’ve,” he chuckled, “you’ve put the idea in my head. You don’t like that. It frightens you, this notion that you might have to give up some small amount of control. You’re... wondering if I’d do it, wondering if I’d put my own wellbeing at risk to screw you over.” Matt smirked, sadistically content to hear that heartbeat hike. “And now you are... aware you don’t actually know me that well at all. You don’t know if I’ll take that one small foothold and exploit the hell out of it until I get what I want. You’re not sure if I’ll hurt us both for just a little power, a little edge. So let me answer that for you.” Matt traced his fingers over the cold metal bars. “I’m a lawyer.”

Fisk swallowed. He was unsettled, yes, but only on the inside. “Were,” he corrected. “You were a lawyer. But that is not a life you lead anymore.”

“Not right now,” Matt agreed, surrendering to the truth of it. “All I am— to you, to myself even— is an incubator. And there’s nothing but death at the end of it. Who wouldn’t want to speed that up just to piss you off?”

“You won’t kill yourself,” Fisk said. He knew that fact. They had established it already.

“No,” Matt conceded. He would not. “But I’d lose the baby before it got that far. And I know you won’t let that happen.”

Fisk banged on the bars, and Matt barely kept himself from flinching. “How can you play with the life of your child?!”

“Because it’s the only thing I have,” Matt said. He let go of the cell and took a half-step back, away from Fisk. “It’s the only thing you care about.”

“I’ll restrain you!” Fisk barked. He gripped the bars and pushed his face almost against them. He was the desperate one now, pursing Matt, being held behind a cage. “I will have them stick a needle in your arm, and I will _force_  the nutrients into your body.”

“No, you won’t,” Matt contradicted, so certain. He brought his hands behind his back, looking cool and collected. It was a change from their usual dynamic, and he was glad to be, at that moment, out from beneath the thumb of heat. “Keeping me tied down and fed through a tube, through an IV, isn’t healthy, not for me, not for the child. We’re better off mobile and on solid food.” Fisk knew that. He wished Matt did not. It took the power from his threats. “What’s really worse,” Matt asked him, “jeopardizing my health or accepting that I actually have something for once?”

Fisk had to think on his answer. When he decided— choosing, of course, the wisest prospect— he said anything but his surrender. “I won’t free you,” he spoke, making known his highest condition.

“No.” Matt shook his head. “And I’m not stupid enough to ask for it.”

Fisk’s face muscles scrunched together as he glared, bitter over having no conceivable choice but to bargain. “What is it you want?” He had to swallow every ounce of pride to say it, which was good in its own way. If their situation were more normal, if they were but men, unchained, unburdened, infatuated, Matt would be contented to see what Fisk sacrificed for their child.

“I’m guessing the medication isn’t on the table,” Matt said, “the one that stops these heats.” He gauged Fisk’s boundaries.

“If I give that to you,” Fisk said, “if I give you that, you stop going into heat.”

“I fail to see the downside,” Matt replied, feeling cocky but hesitant, wondering at Fisk’s direction.

“And I would have no reason to come here.” To Matt, it sounded like a win-win. “You would sit in this cell, day after day after incessant day, with no one to talk to. You would have your books, and your food, and nothing else, for months.”

Fisk described the beginnings of madness. From what isolation Matt already underwent, he knew he could take more. The question was how much more, and for how long? “I’d rather be alone than with you.”

“If that is true,” Fisk said, “then you should ask me again for the medicine. Ask me, Matthew, and I will give it to you.” He called a bluff Matt was not aware he made. Time with Fisk was not something he craved, but, as Matt found, neither did he want to be deprived of it. Three months was a long time to be in solitary. Fisk waited for Matt’s repeated request. He waited. It did not come. “Now,” he said, “tell me what you actually want.”

“What I want...” Decision found him in a time that was lacking in demands. There were many things Matt could ask for, but he knew that a crushing percentage of them would be denied, as already demonstrated. There was no reasonable necessity he needed met at the moment. He considered saving his threat for a day when it would have more use. He decided to taunt, to ask for something insignificant. Matt wanted something small, something ridiculous, so he might convey that his cooperation was not wholly paid for. He would be holding onto his leverage. “Another pillow.”

Fisk was predictably perplexed. “That’s all?” he asked.

Matt tilted his head as a light shrug. “Sleeping on my back’s begun to hurt,” he said. “I wouldn’t mind a pillow to put between my legs when I lay on my side. Help me sleep better.” Then he made certain Fisk understood that, “If I think of something else later, I’ll let you know.”

Fisk was not pleased by Matt’s lingering, living threat.

As soon developed, however, there was no need for the man to worry. Fate decided for Matt, and he wasted his own opportunity. How ironic that the symptom which gave him his advantage was undone by its opposite.

It was a few days later when heat found him again. Fisk came behind it. Food should have been the last thing on Matt’s mind as he lay on his side, hot, exhausted, knotted; however, he often found a great disconnect between his body and mind as of late.

They touched in only the one place. Matt’s arms were folded over his chest or extended off the side of the bed. Fisk kept his to himself, resting on his side or brought close in front, touching Matt’s back only incidentally. It was a day where they did not want to talk— about anything. There was nothing but breath, harder from Matt than from Fisk. Recently, he became more tired and more winded than he could ever recall being, especially after the small exertion of sex. He was the one to end the quiet, once he finally found the energy to do so.

“Some things,” he said, “some things have been considered a joke for so long we forget the real life influence behind them.” His preamble sounded more serious than his actual point. “Pregnant people,” he said, “and cravings. It’s a joke— exaggerated and we all laugh. But I would,” he chuckled himself, “do just about anything for a hot dog with everything on it. And I mean everything, piled so high that it- it almost falls off when you eat it.”

Fisk did not reply for a moment, and when he did, it was only to say, “It’s too unhealthy.” The baby’s health— and by extension Matt’s— was more important than any fleeting craving.

“It’s not like I eat junk often,” Matt defended, “not even in the real world, but a little can’t—”

“No.”

Fisk did not care about the harm of one hot dog. He liked denying Matt. Sometimes he waited for a question to come, to give him that opportunity to be cruel.

“I’ve never been to Coney Island,” Matt spoke, a seeming digression. “It sounds odd since I was born here, raised here, but when I was a kid there were better ways to spend a buck. When I got a little older, I was in a Catholic orphanage. Having fun wasn’t outlawed, but it wasn’t a priority. After that... not enough time, not enough whimsy.” Matt regretted not taking the opportunity to do something so carefree and pointless. He cleared his throat. “But I’ve heard— over and over my whole life— I’ve heard about the hot dogs there. I’m sure they’re nothing special, but it is... all... I can think about right now.”

Matt did not expect his want to be met, and Fisk was quick to shut him down. “The park is closed for the off-season,” he said. It was a concise, absolute no, easier than arguing. The calendar, not Fisk himself, was the villain. Even if the food were served year round, he could hide behind his defense. Matt could not knowledgeably contradict it.

But Matt wanted. He wanted as he had heretofore only craved a goal in life or Fisk when in heat. It was not a joke when he said he could not take his mind from something so ridiculous as food. “The deal,” he finally decided, “is I eat whatever you put in front of me that I can make myself swallow. I won’t skip a single meal. But I want one day a week where I can have whatever I choose, no matter how... horrible, how unhealthy. That’s what I want.”

It was, in the grand scheme of everything, a very simple and a very reasonable demand. Fisk had no cause to deny him other than stubbornness. He acknowledged that fact. “I want your word,” he said.

“No hunger strikes.” They prided themselves on being men of their word. There was only shame, not victory, in breaking it. Shame from an enemy was too insufferable to bear. In that way, they had made it impossible to lie to one another. What that meant, what it could be so easily manipulated into, was the so ludicrous idea that they, upon a vow, trusted each other. Matt could hardly believe it. “I swear.” And Fisk trusted him.

“Very well,” he said. “Tomorrow you may... have whatever you want.” He was reluctant to concede, but he would buy the peace of mind it gave him. “And again in a week’s time, so on until the end.”

Matt nodded his head and relaxed into the mattress. He was pleased with himself, but still he recognized his win as insubstantial. He could have gotten more with his threat, in time, after thought, but he also knew he would look forward to that one seventh of his remaining life.

After a moment, Fisk let himself unwind as well. He accepted his loss, recognized it as a lesser evil than what Matt might have planned, and he relaxed. He moved his hand from his own side and put it on Matt, on his stomach, on the baby.

“Have you been to Coney Island?”

Fisk delayed his response until he could decide if he wanted to say it, that simple thing. “Yes,” he answered.

“How are the hot dogs?”

“The same,” he told Matt. “The same as... anywhere else. They are nothing special, and you’re not missing out.”

Matt smirked, not sure what it meant that, “You’re lying.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is something I don’t think I’ve ever done before when writing a fic, but I think... I’m going to poll the audience.
> 
> Is there anything anyone would like to see me include? Anything you want Matt or Fisk to do? Any interactions? Any conversations? Any pregnancy symptoms? (Though obviously I’m not going fluffy or humorous with symptoms. I turned cravings into a tense bargain, for God’s sake.)
> 
> Keep in mind, this fic is all but finished. It already has an ending. But it is strung along in such a disjointed way that there is much filler. I could add an extra chapter in if I felt like it and could make it fit. So if anyone has a request, I might be open to including it. And you may speak anonymously if you choose. But please note that there might not be a place for what you want, or I might have something similar to it planned for the future. But I do welcome suggestions. I’ll wait a little before submitting the next chapter in case anyone wants to comment here. If there are no requests, I’ll carry on as usual.


	13. Don't Ask; Don't Tell

“Oh, god,” Matt groaned. “Keep going, keep— oh!”

He wanted to jerk his cock and expedite the release that was finally coming, but Fisk had pinned both his hands to the mattress with those great fists of his. He laid across Matt’s back, enveloping him with a weight that felt confining, dominating, restrictive, good.

“Do it, do it,” Matt whimpered, hating that he kept asking for it, asking for more of it. “I need it, Fisk— god!” Begging did nothing but keep his mouth busy. Sometimes, though, Matt needed that outlet. He felt Fisk’s knot on his ass, almost full, almost ready. “Put it in me,” he asked, panting his plea. “Give it to me, Fisk... Please.”

Fisk was not ready, and he made Matt wait until he was.

“Not yet.”

He rarely spoke when they fucked, and when he did— if he did— it was usually a remark made at the expense of Matt’s pride. Yes, he let Matt do all of the talking, incoherent as it was. Perhaps he had nothing to add, or maybe he delighted too absolutely in the self-debasing words his enemy spoke. Fisk did not want to interrupt Matt from making a weak and wanton fool of himself.

“Please, please, Fisk. Damn it, I need you. Do it. Do it now.”

Hands pressed Matt’s deeper into the mattress, like they were trying to imbed him. He could barely move enough to grip the sheets, to let them dry the sweat off his palms.

“Just do it,” he pleaded. His voice was quiet and tired, so tired. Heat hit him in the middle of the night, and he had to wait until his breakfast to tell someone. “Make it stop. Make it stop.”

Fisk was not completely ready, but he pushed inside anyway. Mercy sounded too uncharacteristic, so it was surely a want for silence that compelled him. Matt’s begging was no longer enjoyable once it turned pathetic.

“God!” Matt shouted, feeling so marvelously full. Fisk let go of his hands and Matt put one on himself. He came right away. “Thank you, thank you,” he said, too dazed and disoriented to care that he was thanking the man who subjected him to his torment. “Thank you.”

Fisk pulled Matt over and they laid down, knotted together, away from the mess. New sheets would come.

Matt’s mind cleared almost immediately, almost completely. It was like smothering a fire. The flame went out but the heat remained, and it could easily be stoked back to life.

Feeling his shame, Matt said nothing. He tried to pretend it had not happened. He caught his breath. He heard Fisk panting in his ear, huffing on the back of his neck. They calmed down eventually.

Fisk knew Matt would not speak, not after one of his more humiliating litanies. Even a change of subject was embarrassing, because they both knew it would be just that.

“I won’t ask,” Fisk swore, and Matt knew he was talking about the child, that enduring question between them. “When you’re- When you’re like that, I know you have no control. To take advantage of it would make me... dishonorable.”

“I’m glad you feel that way,” Matt said. “Because I know I would tell you.”

“You could say it now,” Fisk urged, “of your own... volition. While your mind is your own. Say it now and admit what we both know.”

“I can’t.”

“You mean you won’t.”

Matt did not reply. He could say it. He would not. Fisk did not deserve the satisfaction of surrender and an answer. He deserved to be kept waiting, to wonder and wonder if the child he went through so much trouble for was even his. Matt would deny him peace of mind.

“I need a better way to contact you.” Matt felt no embarrassment over changing the subject now. “Waiting to send word by other people, it’s... it’s an insufficient system.”

“I’ll look into it.” His words sounded stale and meaningless. Matt knew it would hardly be the biggest priority on his plate, not after Matt refused him once again. As Fisk was made to wait, so too would Matt.

“You won’t.”

“But I can.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This would be one of the shorter chapters, sorry. I like where this one ends and didn’t want to add anything.
> 
> And I want to say that I’m not ignoring the suggestions I got. Love you guys. They just have to be added in at the right spot. That should come in a few chapters.


	14. Stories We Tell Our Young

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic now has over 100 subscribers. Damn. That’s a lot of people to disappoint. Hah.
> 
> Also you'll notice there is now a set number of chapters. I'm fairly certain I have all that I'll be writing and won't be adding any more.

Matt stood as Fisk dressed. It put the man on edge, like he expected another bout of senseless fighting. Matt gathered his things as he prepared for a shower, antagonizing Fisk in his own way, making the man fear him without giving a reason why. Fisk dreaded the sheer possibility of what unrequited violence Matt could beget. Each passing week made it more difficult for Fisk to imagine fighting back without the consequence of injury.

“What will you tell him?”

“About what?” Fisk asked.

“About me,” Matt edified. He hung his clothes back up on the newly vacated nails. “When he asks about me— and he will ask— what will you tell him?”

“You died,” Fisk answered. “You died after having given birth.”

“Smart,” Matt commended. He turned around, initiating a rare conversation in which they faced one another. “It’s very smart.” He nodded his head idly as he thought over the simple explanation. “He fills the blanks in for himself, and you never even have to lie.”

“I won’t lie to my son,” Fisk swore. He adjusted his jacket, though its placement was plenty neat already. His movements conveyed overcompensation, guilt.

“But then there’s the darker side to half-truths,” Matt said. He paused, and while Fisk did not prompt him to elaborate, he knew the man was waiting for it. Matt cleared his throat. “He’ll think he killed me. He’ll think it was his fault; screw complications. Will you let him believe that? Will you really let him believe that his first act in this world was to kill so indiscriminately?”

Matt could not see Fisk’s face, but he sensed a change in the man. His heart rate swiftly spiked and dropped back down. His breath got caught. His shoes scraped as he turned slightly away, as if Matt humiliated him.

“I have plenty of time to... come up with other options,” he said, “if I should reconsider that one.”

“You don’t want him involved with this world you’ve fallen into,” Matt said. “I know you don’t. You’re a good man because of that... Wilson.”

Fisk’s heart fluttered, pumping blood through him, flooding his pulse. He swallowed and his thick neck pressed against the collar of his shirt. Matt had not called him by his first name since the day they met. Fisk was aware.

“Stop talking,” he said. He swung his arm, waving Matt off. “Be quiet.”

“You want what’s best for him,” Matt pressed. “You care about him, my son.”

Fisk took a great step forward, and Matt retreated further against the brick wall. “Our son!” he exclaimed. His shared possession was unintentional. He took it back immediately. “My son,” he corrected.

“Wilson—”

“Quiet!” He could not take the sound of his name, that manipulation which forced intimacy and memory. He put a hand over Matt’s mouth, silencing him. His other hand gripped the back of Matt’s neck to keep him from escaping. “My son,” he said again. “My son with an enemy, with an impediment. He will not know you, Mr. Murdock.” The title he had never used reestablished their divide. “He will never hear so much as a whisper of your existence. I will tell him you died. I will tell him whatever I must to make tale of your life slip away into disinterest. I will _spare_  my son the unkind knowledge that the omega who birthed him fought a losing battle for strangers on the streets. _You_  put your life at risk— you. And I won’t be burdened with guilt for making you pay a price you knew was coming.”

Fisk ripped his hands away and let Matt fall against the wall.

“I will tell my son— _my_  son— whatever I choose. And in this, you will have no say. And of... this, you will never know.” Fisk took a breath as he calmed down. “I’m going to kill you... Mr. Murdock.”

“You don’t sound so sure,” Matt remarked. Fisk was convincing himself. It was all his many words amounted to. “He’s going to ask,” Matt said, “and you won’t be able to make it go away without a lie, not quietly, not pleasantly.”

“Then I will lie,” he decided. It was better than questions, questions, so many questions about such an abhorred subject. “And you will go away.”

“No... I won’t.”

Matt would haunt him. They both knew it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I ever did switch to Fisk’s perspective (I won’t, never will, and am leaving it strictly to reader speculation), I would address his worry and planning over how to explain things to Vanessa. So that, if he is going to lie to the child, they might represent her as its mother. But the mountains of stress and difficulty there is that Fisk refuses to lie to the people he cares about. He specifically promised Vanessa he would not to lie to her. He would have to tell her the whole truth. So while Matt’s in a cage and Fisk has all the power there, Fisk is experiencing a loss of control in his own mind in the outside world.
> 
> I almost want to add a chapter where Vanessa is told about Matt and wants to meet him so that the idea of killing him will seem justified. But she doesn’t have Fisk’s prejudices against Matt and is just a little more good. But also if Matt were released, he would send Fisk to prison, and she wouldn’t want that either. So it’s tempting to add Vanessa, but at the same time Fisk would run the clock down putting off telling her, for fear of how she would react. It’s a pretty big, morally evil deal after all, holding a pregnant man captive with plans on killing him and keeping his baby. 
> 
> Truth be told, he probably plans on telling her everything after Matt is dead. It releases her from any possible feelings of guilt over a situation and death she thought she could have prevented. Telling her the truth while Matt is alive makes Vanessa an accomplice, and Fisk wouldn’t do that to her. But after it’s done, it’s done. Nothing she could have done to stop it.


	15. False

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would like to start by giving a big thank you to the people who regularly comment— or have commented only once. It makes me excited to post. You guys are great.
> 
> That said, I will be slowing down in the update schedule. So it’s no longer going to be once a week. And the reason for that is until now I’ve had every chapter at least mostly written. But now I have to buy myself some time to finish the chapters that are only partially written. I thought that slowing down the updates of what I have would be better than updating regularly and then coming to an abrupt stop while I work. So I’ll update when I update and we’ll all be surprised for when that is. Haha.

“I was told you needed to discuss something.”

Matt was waiting at the bars when Fisk entered. He was not in heat, and their conversation would be brief. “I need a way to call you,” he said, no longer asking, now demanding.

“Suddenly a messenger isn’t good enough?” Fisk questioned. Matt had not been made to wait for him in weeks. The spontaneous request sounded like the whimpering of a child who always wanted more than what he had.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I had...” The irrelevance of the matter now made Matt feel excessive in the commotion he was causing. But the night before he had been alone, and concerned. “I had, uh, false contractions,” he brought himself to say. “I know they’re normal. I’ve read about them. I know. But they didn’t feel that way last night.”

Matt could tell his newest symptom troubled the man. He heard Fisk’s heart voicing the concern he did not permit his mouth to utter. “How do you know it was false?”

“It stopped,” Matt answered. “And because there isn’t a baby here,” he added, giving that most obvious assessment and giving it with derisive sarcasm. “We might not be so lucky next time. He could die. I could. You need to move us.”

“No.”

“Then give me a way to contact you, anywhere at any hour,” Matt ordered. He would not bargain, not over this, not over a matter where they and their child all three benefited. Fisk would obey him.

“I can’t...” Fisk considered his very limited options. “I cannot give you a phone.”

“No shit.” Matt took satisfaction from watching Fisk dangle, hanged by his own laws. He himself was not worried and would not fret. It was Fisk’s problem to solve. It was Fisk who was responsible, Fisk who would have to exploit his wide resources to undo his own restrictions. Matt would wait for whatever he worked out.

“I will... devote my time to an alternative,” Fisk said. For once, Matt felt like a priority. “Until then, a man will be left outside the door. If you need anything, call him.”

It was a somewhat comforting notion, the idea that someone would be there, ready for any need he might have.

Heat came before any calamity.

Fisk dismissed the man in the hall. He entered the prison. He knotted Matt and laid behind him. His deep breaths came slow and warm and blew individual strands of Matt’s hair around. Fisk took a great many of those breaths before he spoke.

“Has it happened again,” he questioned, “the false labor?”

“Yes.”

“Does it hurt?” His motivation in the question was either concern or gratification— gratification from knowing Matt was abused for him in a natural way that left no injury. Fisk was innocent in the pain but would take from it a satisfaction.

“Yes.” Matt’s contractions did not last long, but they ached and stabbed the entire time. “I can manage,” he said, reminding Fisk of what he could endure and that a few moments of cramping were nothing. “What happens when I can’t?”

“I have something,” Fisk told him. “I’ll give it to you when we’re done.”

What he had was a small plastic box with a button on the front and a string attached to the whole thing like a necklace. Matt chuckled. “Don’t they give these to senior citizens so they can page emergency services?”

“It’s been modified,” Fisk explained. “Press it once when you’re in heat, twice for an emergency. A message will be sent to my personal phone.”

“Is that so?” Matt pushed the button.

“My phone which I do not bring here.” He would not risk Matt taking it from him. Fisk only ever entered with the clothes on his back. “It has been tested extensively. Do you trust me in this?”

“I don’t have a choice.”

“Do you trust me?” Fisk pressed.

Matt nodded. “I do.”

“Good.” Somehow, it relieved Fisk to hear him say it. “You may call me now... anytime, whether it’s because you’re in heat or because of the- of the baby.”

“You could have moved me,” Matt said. He had suggested it in their last meeting only as a passing remark. Now, he said it more seriously. “Wherever the hell you live, you could have chained me up there. Do you really think I’m still that dangerous?”

“Yes,” he answered. “You are... very capable. The only way you could leave here is if I were to...” His breathing became slow and hard at his own horrid conditions. His posture was straight and rigid. His head tilted shamefully down to the floor. “I would... deafen you. I would cut out your tongue so you could not scream or- or taste. I would take away the ability to smell. I would... Every sense, I would take from you, leaving only that one of touch. You are too dangerous to have them outside of this cage. To let you leave, I would have to take them, to cripple you. You don’t want that. Neither do I.”

“Don’t,” Matt said. He wanted to sound stern, but his voice was too quiet and far too emotional. He realized that, in being so protective of what senses he had left, he was begging. “Don’t- don’t... Don’t do that.”

“I won’t,” Fisk promised. He recognized the panic mere suggestion caused. He did not revel in its torture. “Stay here. Page me if there’s an emergency.”

Matt would remain where he was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What kind of horrible person would write even the hypothetical suggestion of Matt losing any more senses? Oh wait... That was me. I’m that horrible person. Guilty as charged. Isn’t the very idea of it haunting and inhuman? Eeh.
> 
> Remember when Matt was deaf for a few minutes and the poor guy was so panicked at losing another sense? Remember how they never brought it up again? Shame. Shame on you, season two.
> 
> I’m the sort of lowlife who imagines blind/deaf Matt Murdock.


	16. Take Me to Church

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So nbd, but listen to this big deal. This fic now has more comments, kudos, and bookmarks than any other Fisk/Matt fic on this site, even beating out my favorites. Granted, there are only twenty fics total, but it’s something. So I thank everyone again because that literally wouldn’t be possible without you guys. I am especially, continuously grateful for comments. It makes the whole thing feel interactive and not like I’m throwing words out there with no proof but a view count that people are reading them. Yay!
> 
> Thank you for hoisting this fic up to the top, and I, as always, welcome others to write Fisk/Matt fics and challenge my title. Come at me.

“I’ve been calling him Daniel.”

Fisk was silent. Matt waited for his disruption. He spoke on in its absence.

“In my head and when I speak out loud like the books suggest, I... I call him Daniel.”

Fisk dressed. Coarse knuckles slid inside nice sleeves, grinding against the cotton. When his arms were through, he folded the material back once and fastened his cufflinks with a click.

“You’re not a religious man.” It was an obvious assessment. The demons Fisk struggled with were not theological. “You are... righteous like one, and maybe that makes you all the more dangerous.” Fisk did not interrupt. Perhaps he was curious. Perhaps he did not want to give any indication he was listening. Matt knew he was. “There’s a Bible story,” Matt told him, “one of the... dozens and dozens you learn in church, one of the ones that... that stuck with me.” He felt attention given. He felt expectation and intrigue, despite Fisk’s continued show of disinterest. “Daniel in the lions’ den,” Matt said, “the story of an innocent and the king who loved him. But the king was... manipulated by those who didn’t have, to put it lightly, Daniel’s best interest at heart. As a result of their jealousy, their machinations, the king was forced to punish Daniel. He sentenced him to the absent mercy of a pit of lions. The king, well, he worried all night. He hoped that the God Daniel loved so much would protect him. The night passed. The king rose sleeplessly from his bed. At dawn, he went to the pit.” Matt smiled. “And Daniel was safe, unharmed. ‘God,’ he said, ‘sent... an angel to close the mouths of the lions. Because I am innocent in His eyes.’ The king was... relieved for Daniel, and he was angry to have been exploited by the jealous men. And so he had them and their families thrown into the lions’ den to suffer the fate they had orchestrated for Daniel.” Matt took a breath at the story’s completion. He blew it out in an even exhale, turning his mind from Sunday school to the there and then. “It always stayed with me, that story,” he said. “Not the mercy, not the piety. I guess little boys just love violence and a bloody ending. But lately,” he professed, “I see... allegory to our situation. I’ve been thinking less about the moral of the story, less about the brutal retribution, and more about Daniel himself. I think of the king that was powerless to save him, the God that protected him, the ill will that surrounded him. And I wonder... which are you, Fisk? Are you the godly hand that will shield him, shelter him from evil, or are you the conspirators that sentence him to it, however unintentional it might be? Will you condemn him to a lions’ pit of your own making, that world that you- that you walk in with drug dealers, kidnappers, and violence?”

Matt stopped talking and silence set in like a flood. It filled the space. It elevated the volume of what sounds remained.

He heard the lights buzzing.

He heard Fisk’s breath and heartbeat.

He heard his own in his chest.

But nothing else.

Fisk was quiet. He thought. As Matt asked and wanted, the man applied the story to himself. He translated it to their situation. “You tell me to pick which I might be,” he replied at last, “and yet you must already think yourself God, the creator, the would-be savior.”

“No,” Matt disagreed. “No... I am the... weak king. I allowed myself to be taken in by malice. I’m unable to stop what’s been set in motion. I can’t protect him from the fate I doomed him to. All I can do is hope for his safety.” He paused, knowing that what he said next was a threat saturated in its impotence, but he was no less sincere. “But come morning, I will raise Daniel from the pit, and I will put the guilty in his place... so that the beasts may devour them in judgment.”

Fisk had every right to mock his declaration. He did not. Perhaps he gave credence to the words, despite Matt’s inability to back them up. No, he did not address Matt’s threat. He ignored it completely. He dismissed the entire discussion and its meaning.

“My son has no name,” he said, and he would not use the one Matt assigned. “I have not given him one yet.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoops. I just remembered that Jessica Jones and Luke Cage have a daughter named Danielle. Who is named after Danny Rand. That’s so many Daniels in one squad. Haha. Oh well. I’m not changing it now. Lose the amazing metaphor I created in this chapter? Fat chance.


	17. By Force if Necessary

“I paged you.”

“I was busy.”

Matt dared not delude himself with the idea that Fisk dropped everything the second his phone rang, but the severity, the importance of his condition did sometimes tempt with the idea that he was a priority. Fisk did not dawdle, no, but he did not rush either, depending on whatever business it was which detained him.

“Let’s just get it over with,” Matt muttered. His face was hot and flushed. His stomach was tense. His clothes were gone, and Fisk had entered in the middle of that futile compulsion Matt had of fingering himself for relief. He wiped his wet hand on the bed and turned over on his knees, waiting for Fisk to undress and join him.

His hands were, as always, so cool and so hard on Matt’s skin. The callused fingertips dragged leisurely down Matt’s sides, conforming to the outline Fisk knew well by now but continued to visit with novel intrigue, as if still learning. Matt could not rush him, could never rush him, not with words or actions. He was, every time, at the mercy of Fisk’s decided pace and those groping hands that went down his flesh and over his hips until they were pulling his ass apart.

Nothing would ever feel as good as when Fisk slipped inside. Matt would challenge whoever asserted there was a greater pleasure, be he a man fond of exaggeration or one who drank from a desert oasis. Matt resented that Fisk could make him feel so good so instantaneously. He hated it. Hours of waiting were lessened in a flash and nearly forgotten by the end— on a good day.

With its delay of satisfaction, heat did not leave Matt so quickly. Its stay was unpleasant. He shuddered with feverish chill. He huffed great shaking breaths through his nose. Fisk touched the burning skin of his arm and rubbed. He soothed. The motion’s intent of comfort and consideration was undeniable but unbelievable. Fisk felt guilty for being late.

Matt pawed at and gripped the bed sheet in a tight frenzied fist, nearly pulling it off the corner it wrapped around. He worked through the frustration until his breathing became more normal and his hand unclenched. His face felt warm but no longer hot and dewy. He was able to see more than his aching fever, tensing muscles, and screaming need for gratification. Matt saw Fisk— felt Fisk— still rubbing his arm. The man went up and down the length of it in gentle strokes. When he noticed that Matt’s inhales no longer sputtered and gasped, he removed his hand.

“You smell like blood.” Matt found some semblance of his usual focus, and he could not ignore the acrid stench. “Is that what you were doing? Apparently killing a man is more important than helping the one carrying your... alleged child?”

Matt was not worth an explanation, but Fisk’s greatest downfall came when he defended himself. “I didn’t kill him,” he said. “I sent a message. I hit him.” He brought his large hand in front of Matt’s face to sniff. A quick inhale told that the scent and taste of blood was coming from his knuckles. It was the victim’s lesson spread upon the split skin of Fisk’s hand and dried on top of his own forcefully spent blood. Neither had been cleaned well, not with soap and water, only rubbed at with a cloth no doubt.

“You’re capable of death,” Matt stated. “Abstaining isn’t innocence.” He would discredit Fisk’s every attempt to justify or redeem himself.

“We’re all capable of death,” Fisk claimed. “Are you innocent because you’ve never carried through with what needed to be done? You swore to kill me the night I captured you. Are you innocent because your... attempt failed? Do you truly believe that each act of violence by your hands means innocence because you didn’t kill? You think you can destroy a man in whichever way you choose so long as he is... breathing at the end.”

“I don’t kill,” Matt said. He would never truly let it go so far. That is what he told himself.

“Would you kill me if it guaranteed your freedom?” Fisk questioned. “Would you kill me before I kill you?” His hand was heavy on Matt’s side and stomped as it marched to the front. “Or would you drop the gun again?”

Matt did not have an answer, but admitting to his indecision was tantamount to defeat. Did the slipping remnants of time make him desperate enough to compromise his morals, those morals which were already equivocal and flimsy in his wildest moments of rage and evil? Could he kill for the preservation of his own life? Could he kill Fisk? Matt dared not say— nor even think for longer than a glimpse— a concept which crawled uninvited through his brain: killing Fisk now would be more difficult. No more or less impossible than before, simply more difficult— before the fact and in its aftermath.

He said nothing, which was as much his answer as saying he did not have a definitive one. That was how it presented. That was how Fisk regarded it.

“We are all capable of death,” the man reiterated. “Some people, they... they find it easier. But every man has his circumstance.” He took in a deep breath that pressed his chest and stomach against Matt’s back. He exhaled and it gusted against Matt’s neck. “You would have to spare my life, spare it in your darkest hour, to prove me wrong.” The arrogance was loathsome.

A heavy persisting hand was on Matt’s pregnant stomach. He shoved the arm away. Fisk immediately tried to return it. They struggled back and forth, Matt’s two hands pushing against Fisk’s one. It was an uneven contest in which strength of numbers did not benefit. Fisk won, of course. He always did in displays of power. He always would. There was a reason boxers had weight classes: a fair fight.

Matt elbowed him in a way and in a place that would surely bruise. Fisk grunted at the jab and harshly gripped Matt around the arm to prevent a repeat. It did not stop his tenacity. Matt continued quarreling against Fisk until the man rolled them over and put himself on top again. He took special care to exert no weight pressing Matt’s stomach into the mattress. He used the leverage of his position to cage Matt and shackle him around each wrist.

“Stay still,” Fisk ordered. He tightened his hands on Matt, constricting his wrists with the strength he had in abundance. There was a preprogrammed subservience in Matt’s brain that told him to surrender in this time of desperate heat. He teetered between each option, loving defiance but compelled by unwilling obedience. “Stay,” Fisk said again. But Matt rebelled, thrashing in the hold that was tighter and stronger than any restraint. He threw his head back, and Fisk barely dodged the blow it would have been to his nose. Fisk let go and instead sat back on the bed, bringing Matt up with those powerful arms, wrapping them around his chest, sitting him in his lap. Matt’s arms were caged to his sides. Fisk’s legs came around and weighted both of his to the bed. He kept Matt confined within that squeezing embrace. It was tight and constrictive. Any small movement remaining was inconsequential. Matt futilely tensed over and over but quickly tired and gave in. He sat, knotted, in the man’s lap. Fisk rested his head against the base of Matt’s neck. When he spoke, the words vibrated on Matt’s skin. “He moves,” Fisk said, explaining himself as though he had to, as though his motivations were not already so apparent. “He moves after we...” Sex was a shifting, writhing ordeal that woke the baby every time. “I like to feel him.”

“I don’t give a damn,” Matt growled. He was rigid in Fisk’s hold but let the man support his weight without another fight.

They stayed like that. Fisk did not loosen his suppressing, enveloping grip. Matt went lax after several minutes simply because it was less exhausting. He was exasperated when they began, worn down by sex, and drained completely by the fight that followed. He dropped his shoulders and sighed. Fisk decided that was the end of his animosity.

He moved his hand with all the caution of a man who endeavored to pet a wild, snarling animal. He placed the wide palm up against Matt’s stomach and waited apprehensively for retaliation. If Matt decided to fight him, they would return to the same confining position. Time and again, Fisk prevailed at close range. He was too strong, and denying him did nothing but repeat a cycle. The weight of that proven weakness, having to acknowledge it, made Matt feel helpless in a way he had not since being struck blind, since his father died. The thoughts and emotions of all three events hit at him with unprecedented severity. Logically, he knew it was not so great a thing to be worth crying over. He blamed his condition for it.

Matt cried but tried to keep it silent, knowing the worst thing Fisk could do was notice. He let the slow, emotional tears drip without mention. For a moment, he got away with it.

One wet, shaking inhale was all it took. Fisk tensed upon hearing the unmistakable sound. He was stiff around Matt with no idea of how to react. He did not know what action was permitted for captor unto his captive. The situation confounded him unpleasantly.

One second, two, five, eight. He settled again. The flat sheet from the bed fluttered and raised with Fisk’s hand. He brought the cloth to Matt’s face. He said nothing and allowed action to prevail over whatever weak words he might consider.

Matt did not want Fisk’s pity, but strategy bade him to exploit it. He took the sheet and wiped at his eyes and face. The texture was harsh upon his skin and only added to the unpleasantness of the situation. It was irritation upon humiliation. Matt shook with strong emotion. His breaths stuttered from it. He caught and rubbed at each new tear.

Neither of them said anything, and Matt got himself back under control in less than two minutes. He went over his face one more time and dropped the sheet.

“I’m...” Fisk began but left unfinished. If it was meant to be an apology, he did not have the courage nor the humility to say it, not to Matt.

“I didn’t... I didn’t mean to do that. It wasn’t deliberate,” Matt said, and that was all he would say about it.

“I know.” Fisk knew he was too strong, and certainly too stubborn, to cry when capable of stopping.

One of his arms was across Matt’s chest, bracing him, holding him still. His other hand rested against the bed. The fingers twitched and the arm lifted. He wanted to touch Matt’s stomach. It was a compulsion which would never fade. He did not, however, want a repeat of Matt’s emotional state that made them both so uncomfortable and awkward.

Fisk cleared his throat. He waited.

He waited.

Begrudgingly, he asked, “May... I?” He did not want to ask it any more than he wanted to apologize, but somehow he got those two words out.

“What happens if I say no?” Matt could not deny his curiosity over whether or not his consent had any effect.

“I don’t know.” He was not lying. Fisk had the decency to tell the truth. He did not know his own temper or what it could inflict.

His hand and his question hung in the air, waiting for an answer.

Matt said nothing. He nodded one time, dipping his chin down to his chest. Curiosity remained but was far outdone by lethargy. Matt was too tired to say no and find out what would happen.

Fisk’s touch upon his stomach was less repulsive with permission. His hand was coarse. It smelled like blood. But stimulation against Matt’s skin was always nice, especially during heat. He took a deep breath to fuel his own decision over the matter. When he exhaled, he relaxed even more. His back conformed to the line of Fisk’s chest behind him. Matt sat in the man’s lap and his stomach was petted.

Fisk handled him less brutishly when they went a second time and a third.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fisk can’t take Matt crying. Haha. He doesn’t know what to do and it makes him feel unbearably awkward. If Matt were smart, he’d abuse it. But he has too much pride for that.
> 
> checa2095 and StripedAndBowtied requested I address the belly touching and Matt’s hormones getting the better of him. He’s usually pretty strong but triggers are a bitch.


	18. And Many More

In a new and unexpected development, Fisk brought Matt his dinner. He stood there, in the cage, waiting for Matt to come to him. He obviously had something to say, and curiosity towards his intentions could not be denied. Matt went, always, to the chance for a conversation, hoping, always, that it would be a civil one.

The food was nothing out of the ordinary. There was fish, seasoned nicely; a helping of vegetables; and potatoes. But there was an addition off to the side, on a plate of its own.

“Something... sweet,” Matt observed. It smelled almost sickeningly sweet with much sugar. There was custard and cake and a number of spices he could list by name. He was not used to dessert. “What’s the occasion?”

“It- It’s your...” Fisk paused. He cleared his throat but still faltered on the words he was trying so hard to make. He knelt down and pushed the tray through to Matt. He stood back up. “Happy birthday.”

“Oh.” Matt smelled the dessert again, not a traditional cake per se, but it was supplied as one for his birthday. “I lose some days down here,” he said. “I thought it might have been getting close, but I...” The unasked for and unexpected gesture was atypical. “Thank you.”

“Zuppa Inglese,” Fisk said, “a favorite of mine since I was a boy. I thought you might...” With his hands now free, Fisk fingered his cufflinks, behind his back where he thought it might go unnoticed. “You’re welcome.”

“No gift?” Matt joked, in no way anticipating one.

“What would you have,” Fisk asked, “within reason?”

Matt had carefully considered it since the last time he lost leverage. If Fisk thought he would settle for another pillow, or more books, or a second junk food day, he was wrong. “My friends,” he said. “I know you keep tabs on them.” He did not doubt it.

Fisk sighed. “Your friends,” he said, “they... don’t know what happened to you. The timing was wrong, perhaps, or maybe you lied to me about how much they knew. They blame me for it. One of them even... approached me on the street, if you can believe such a thing.”

Matt smirked. “Yeah, actually I do.”

“They have followed me. Sometimes... when I am late in coming to you,” he pardoned himself, “it is because of the measures I must go through to lose them. But they have given up, I believe. Recently they have. Perhaps they finally doubt my involvement in your disappearance.”

Matt was not sure what to make of that. He knew Foggy and Karen would pursue a lead long after it dried up. But he also knew that rationale would compel them to look into alternatives, lest they miss some other culprit. “Don’t hurt them,” he said. “You promised you wouldn’t hurt them.”

“I _said_ ,” Fisk emphasized his lack of promise, “that I would not hurt them without reason. They strive to give me one. I will not let them expose me, Matthew. I am not to blame for what happens.”

“Let me contact them,” Matt suggested, “a letter.”

“No,” Fisk denied.

“I can make them stop,” he reasoned. “We both benefit.”

“No.”

“Then you are responsible,” Matt said. “I gave you an option. If you don’t take it, you will be to blame, Fisk, for whatever happens. I won’t forgive you.” What a pathetic threat with a weightless consequence.

“If anything happened,” Fisk slowly said, “do you think I would tell you?”

The question gave Matt pause. It angered him. He exhaled with a huff. His shoulders dropped. “No,” he said. “No, you wouldn’t, would you?” His imprisonment continued to unlock many tragedies. “You’d silence two people who just want to find their friend, and then you would- you’d keep it from me.” If Fisk felt guilt at having it spelled out like that, he hid it well. His heartbeat was normal and his head looked straight and up. “Give me company in here before you kill them,” Matt implored.

“You’re not thinking clearly,” Fisk said, “or would you honestly have them see you... us- us in heat? How idle do you think they would be? How much... shame can you tolerate?”

The very thought of it did mortify. “I wouldn’t need you then,” Matt rationalized. “I wouldn’t need your company. I could take the pills.”

“More favors,” Fisk muttered. He shook his head. “I will not bring anyone else here. More people to kidnap, more to... eliminate when the child is born. You would beg me to spare their lives... I wouldn’t. It is best, Matthew, that you never know what happened. Ignorance is a... a precious thing to have, and that is why I don’t tell you things.”

“Bullshit,” Matt objected. “You like keeping me in the dark so I won’t fight you when I learn the truth. You prefer it when I’m not mad at you.” Matt was perhaps hypocritical in saying that. He too preferred civility over an argument, but that did not mean he wanted the truth withheld from him, not when he had a right to know.

Fisk’s hands were tightly clenched and trembled at his sides as he restrained his temper. “Stop,” he ordered. “I do not want to argue with you.”

“On my birthday?” Matt scoffed. “It’s just a day, Fisk.” He appreciated what small attempts the man made, but, “It’s just a day.”

“You may not attach much significance to it,” Fisk said, “but it is your last one. I was trying to be...”

“Polite?” Matt questioned. “Not a bastard?”

“Kind.”

He was telling the truth, which made his actions all the more astounding. The day was a one time special occasion, but Fisk had no obligation to acknowledge it. He came to Matt selflessly, he brought cake, he answered questions as a gift, he held his tongue against discord, and all for one sole purpose: kindness. Fisk was trying to be kind to him.

“Thank you,” Matt said. “It was a decent attempt.”

“Enjoy your dessert,” Fisk replied. He took a step back, to leave and to let Matt eat. “Happy birthday, Matthew.” He opened the door and had one foot hanging in the hall when Matt spoke again.

“I almost made it to my thirties.”

The comment troubled Fisk, and Matt knew the reason was because it reminded him how young he was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m not bringing up any other holidays. We’re not doing Christmas or anything. Although it probably would have passed already. Matt’s birthday is in April? That’s all I’m seeing. Someone in Marvel was celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Daredevil comic as Matt’s birthday. As good a date as any.
> 
> Sometimes I forget about the massive age difference between them, but Fisk is, quite literally, twice Matt’s age. Because Fisk is fifty-six, based off the year the song in his flashback was released and his age at the time. And Matt’s about twenty-seven (now twenty-eight in this fic— and season two), going off the fact he started law school in 2010. So yes, big age difference. I tend to forget. 
> 
> Where are my sugar daddy AUs? I mean, I know Matt wouldn’t go for that, but I would love to watch Fisk TRY to spoil him.


	19. And You Shall Receive

Fisk did not get out of bed when they were done. Perhaps he was tired with the late night hour, but that did not change the fact it never happened. He always left as soon as he was able. That was the routine. That was how they ended a heat together.

Whatever Fisk’s reason was, Matt did not share in it. His habit was to take a shower as soon as the man was gone. He saw no reason to upset that. He crawled out of Fisk’s arms and from the bed.

He bathed. Fisk watched, and Matt knew Fisk watched. He could do nothing about it except put off showering, which he would not do. Commenting or snapping at Fisk would bring attention onto the situation. Neither of them really liked talking about it. That was why they discussed anything else while knotted, and that was only if they felt the need to speak.

They both pretended that Fisk lingering and Fisk watching was normal.

The water stopped, and with its absence from sound, the man’s boring eyes became so much more apparent.

Matt dried himself. He dressed in a t-shirt and sweatpants that went up a size every few weeks, an accommodation to his own growth.

Fisk was still in the bed. The sheets were gone, balled up, and he sat. He was dressed but for his jacket, which was laid out beside him. Matt wanted to know what was on his mind, but he did not want to ask. He would not ask.

He ignored Fisk. He grabbed a book from the floor and sat on his bed, tucked up against the wall in the space he had left.

Matt read, and Fisk watched him read. He watched Matt’s vacant eyes, an unnecessary component of the tactile process. Fisk liked his eyes, and Matt had noticed. He liked that Matt could not see him. He often took advantage of it. He stared with indulgence and without reciprocity.

“This is what you do?”

Matt’s fingers did not stop moving over the page he read. Being physically exhausted from heat, he often took a nap after Fisk left, after he showered, but he was not sleeping in front of the man. Today, as he sometimes did, he read. “If you see any entertainment besides the books,” he said, “point it out.”

“Do you need more of them,” Fisk asked, “more books?”

“Yes,” Matt answered. His kept his voice bland, cautious of letting Fisk know how much he wanted them. “What’s the price?”

“Stress,” Fisk spoke, and for several seconds, he said nothing more. “Your situation is unfortunate... but necessary. To prevent stress and its effects on the child, I would... distract you.”

“You think, what, if I bury myself in books, I’ll forget everything else?” Matt derided. “I’m imprisoned, Fisk, and I’ll continue to be imprisoned, with nothing but my own death to look forward to. Books and... sex every few days won’t erase that. They barely divert from it.”

“They are better than nothing.”

“What’s the price?” Matt asked again.

“There is none,” Fisk admitted, “but that is not to say I don’t benefit.”

Matt considered Fisk’s motivations and found them squarely focused on the child. “A treadmill.”

“What?”

“Exercise helps clear my mind,” Matt said. “I’m finding it harder and harder to do sit-ups, and I’ll probably lose push-ups soon too. I don’t expect a punching bag. So,” he requested, “I want a treadmill. Because running in place just seems silly.”

“I suppose you’ll want the proper shoes to go with it?”

“By all means,” Matt scoffed, “let me jog barefoot. Maybe I won’t twist my ankle or fall on the baby.”

“No,” Fisk denied, now seeing the dangers in a treadmill. “Think of something else.”

“I’d ask for a stationary bike,” Matt said, “but I don’t think the seat would be comfortable.”

“Is it from—”

“It’s not from knotting,” he interrupted, knowing what Fisk was going to ask. His discomfort came from the general aches of pregnancy. “You’ve done your worst. I’m used to it now. I’m not as... tight as I used to be.” He balked on the terminology, despite all they did together. “Maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe it’ll help when...” Matt drifted off, leaving the future where it was for just a second. “That is unless you’re planning to cut me open. It certainly would be quicker for you, and efficient. And then, of course, with your decision to kill me, I can’t imagine being stitched back up.” Matt slowly closed his book. He let it rest against his chest, atop his stomach. “A part of me always suspected I’d die bleeding out. It’s the... circumstances that I couldn’t have predicted.”

Matt could tell his words perturbed Fisk. The man threatened death often enough, but the graphic, merciless description of a surgery half-finished shook him.

“I would never sentence you to such a disgraceful way to die.”

“No,” Matt agreed, hearing the sincerity in his voice and in his pulse. “No. You can be honorable, Fisk, when you feel like it.”

“I am not a bad man,” he defended. He viewed the acknowledgment of his positive traits as something so important.

“You could be a better good one.” There was much room for improvement.

The next day, a punching bag was brought into Matt’s cell. It was hung from the ceiling while he sat on the bed. He was restrained under a gun and under the warning that if one foot touched the ground while they worked, the generosity would be taken away.

It felt good to hit something.


	20. What Would You Do?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY! Chapter twenty. We are 2/3 of the way through. That’s sort of intimidating to think about, isn’t it? So very much still needing to happen for Matt’s sake, so little time. He is about eight months pregnant now, btw. Time is swiftly running out. Things do start to pick up a little after this chapter though.

“Say it.”

Fisk stayed again. He sat, clothed, on the foot of the bed while Matt towel-dried his hair. Fisk’s feet were flat on the floor and unmoving. His hands were in his lap, but they fiddled with his shirt sleeves, pressing the fabric flat, twisting his cufflink a short degree clockwise then counterclockwise. He was hard at work in thought. Something weighed on him, crushing, grinding, penalizing his past and current decision for inactivity on the subject. It was not a sudden issue but rather one which had built up until, at last, he considered addressing it.

“You might as well,” Matt said, speaking again, urging the man to spit it out already.

“What would you have done?” Fisk asked. He knew he needed to be more specific, and so he was, after a pause. “If I hadn’t found you out in that warehouse,” he posed, “if you left and went about your life until you realized it on your own, what would you have done?”

Matt hung his damp towel on a nail and walked away from it. “It’s a prisoner’s compulsion to... reflect on the circumstances that led to their being caught, and to tweak every variable, big and small, that could have ended differently. I’ve thought about it,” he admitted, “but that’s all it is: a thought. There’s no way to predict how I would act, not without living through it.” Matt sat at the head of the bed, on the edge, a few feet from Fisk. They did not face each other, opting instead to turn ahead or look down at the concrete floor.

Fisk’s hands kept moving, circling around themselves as if one were in orbit of the other. He rubbed them together. He fidgeted. He pulled on the ends his sleeves. “Would you have kept the baby?” For no reason other than the satisfaction of a question, Fisk probed Matt’s brain, reaping what he could from a universe that did not and would not exist.

“I don’t know. On the one hand,” Matt considered, “my life wasn’t in the right place for it— which is a, uh, oversimplification, to say the least. But on the other hand,” he chuckled, “well, I am Catholic.” The religion he often looked upon as his moral compass did loudly proclaim its stance on actions taken so selfishly, even if it was better for all parties involved. “Besides, you, uh, caught me at the deadline. Any longer before I realized, and I couldn’t have... aborted, even if I wanted to.” The word sounded so severe with the finality of its meaning. “So yes,” he realized as he spoke, “I guess I would have— kept it, that is, gone to term. But who can say what about adoption?”

“But you wouldn’t have told me,” Fisk presumed.

“What’s to tell?” Matt countered. He would not confess what Fisk needed to know about the child’s paternity, not even with the most offhanded and fictitious of remarks.

Fisk sighed, wearily and angrily, at the continuation of the game. “If the child were mine,” he conceded, “you wouldn’t have told me.”

“No,” Matt confirmed. “No, I’d already found out who you really were, what you did. Tracking you down man to man, face to face, telling you, it wouldn’t have changed anything between us.”

“You don’t know that,” Fisk defied.

“You winning, you naming the terms of everything,” Matt said, “it put me in a cage. You’re so intense, Fisk, so extreme. I don’t think there’s a world where you would give up that control— all control, any control— and let me call the shots. Sometimes you’re textbook,” he said of the man’s alpha status.

“And other times?”

“An enigma.” He was. The only thing Matt had figured out for certain was that Fisk could always manage to surprise him, if he so chose.

“Would it have stopped you?” Fisk asked. “Would it have stopped your vigilantism?”

Matt sighed. He shrugged and scooted further onto the bed, until the backs of his knees folded over the mattress. “I guess we’ll never know.”

“Omegas... typically put the wellbeing of their children above everything else,” Fisk cited.

“And the general population typically puts their own wellbeing over a stranger’s,” Matt responded. “Yeah, I’m not much like them either.” He had nothing for the man. In matters of the hypothetical, there was not one string of logic that could not be beaten down by another. They could go in circles all evening, contradicting each other but being, at the end, no closer to a conclusion. “It’s not a question that can be answered. The universe where I had to choose is gone. It doesn’t exist. You ruined it, Fisk. You did. So no, we will... never know if having a baby would have gotten rid of me, made your life easier.”

“My life,” Fisk said, “is so much more... difficult with these choices you force me to make.”

“Your choices,” Matt insisted. “You put them there. I didn’t make you do anything. I never have.”

“You challenged me,” Fisk argued, taking all Matt ever did as a personal affront.

“No,” Matt contested, “never one man. Never a dozen, or a hundred, or however many. I never challenged you. I never set out to make it personal. I wanted to fight the injustices I couldn’t keep ignoring. I saw people kidnapped, killed, strung out on drugs. I wanted to help them. I wanted to protect every unlucky son of a bitch born into this... mess of a city. I didn’t challenge you... Fisk. You put us against each other when you became the man at the top of the pyramid. You don’t get to put this on me. You don’t get to blame me any more than you could an honest cop. You love the city,” Matt stated. He did not doubt Fisk’s devotion. “I love the people in it. Without them it’s pointless, Fisk. It’s pointless.”

Matt was unsure how much of his little speech Fisk actually listened to, but he did not interrupt with his own tirade. That was something, however small.

Fisk stood without a word, and the conversation was over. He put on his jacket. “You’re not wrong,” he allowed, “simply small-minded.” Matt did not appreciate the appraisal. “What you did, all... you did, contributed to nothing but a cycle. I will break it.” He buttoned his suit meticulously. “I’m sorry,” he expressed, “that it put us on opposite sides, especially when we... when we have so much in common, when we wanted the same thing.”

“Yeah,” Matt said, “I’m sorry too.” His sincerity was dubious, even to himself; however, Fisk liked to hear the words. It was a waste to have been made enemies. That was true.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Casually thinking about AUs of my own fics again. Shame we’ll never experience that universe where Matt discovers he’s pregnant on his own. Pregnant with Fisk’s child. Trying to decide what he should do about that. 
> 
> Let’s be honest though, it is undeniably something boring and responsible. It’s not like he would be compelled to tell Fisk and then they raise the baby together through joint custody. Matt would have to have some farfetched, manipulative plot in mind to pursue that course. Use their child’s future as some sort of leverage to make Fisk dissolve his criminal empire? While trying to keep his rage in check the whole time from being in such close contact with the man. Never letting on that he’s Daredevil. Yeah right. Except that still wouldn’t work because Fisk is so convinced that what he’s doing IS for the best. So it could be (illogical) fun but... No, this universe right here is really the best way to force contact between them. Sorry, Matt.
> 
> Fisk seeing a pregnant Matt out in public walking along on the sidewalk though…


	21. Fox in the Henhouse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Early-ish update to my amazing readers as a Christmas present. Merry Christmas!
> 
> If you haven’t already noticed, I’m ignoring all canon after 1.09. Karen doesn’t kill Wesley. (idk, she was distracted by her missing friend or something.) And about a hundred other things that I don’t have to go into detail about because this fic is told from Matt’s pov.
> 
> Sometimes this feels like a play for all my lack of rotating characters and settings. I’d pay to see this production. Haha.

It was late— or very early, depending on how the time was viewed. Matt was in bed.

The door opened. It closed.

The lights came on.

The cage opened. It closed.

A metal chair was unfolded and placed on the floor eight feet from Matt’s bed.

The watch on Wesley’s wrist ticked with its high-priced accuracy. He was patient, but eventually he spoke. “I know you’re awake.” He waved his hand, gesturing at the ceiling. “You can’t see the lights, but you hear them, don’t you, or... feel them? That’s how it works? That’s why you have him turn them off?” Matt did not answer. There was a point to the visit. He waited for it. “You probably heard me coming from half a mile away,” Wesley imagined. He chuckled, very brief. “Forgive me if I overestimate you... but I find it’s better than the alternative.”

Matt opened his eyes to signal the end of his ruse. Of course he was awake.

He considered his odds in a fight with Wesley. To his knowledge, the man was not a fighter. He was in shape, yes, but the muscle was concentrated in the wrong areas. Wesley worked out for appearance’s sake, not for advantage in a fight. Matt could take him. Handicapped in an advanced stage of pregnancy, Matt could still win. Wesley was nothing but business savvy and the gun he kept under his jacket.

But before that fight, there would be the gun. Matt would take a shot in the arm or leg— a safe target that would not endanger Fisk’s child. And after the gun, after the fight, before escape, there was the door and the man on the other side of it. That door would never open for Matt.

“What do you want?” Matt sat up in the bed. His blanket fell down his chest, but the sheet clung to the fabric of his t-shirt.

“You know, I never really understood that... all-consuming conquer of... sex,” Wesley said. The last word bathed in its deplorable nature when spoken by him and in that voice. He truly was above it, or he considered himself to be. “But I suppose I’m not meant to, not like him, certainly not like yourself. What I do have, however, is a clear head. I don’t become... swayed by a pretty face. I am rational. I am good counsel.” He crossed one leg over the other, staging an image of relaxation, conveying how little he feared Matt physically. “He asked me yesterday, as a friend, if killing you is really necessary.” Wesley sighed. It sounded like a laugh, his pity towards unfortunate weakness. “Which means you’ve gotten to him. You’ve said something or done something that’s made him doubt himself. My employer... Mr. Fisk does not doubt himself. His confidence is such a defining trait.”

“Some would call it arrogance,” Matt interjected.

“He’s a brilliant man,” Wesley continued, “and it is truly an honor to watch him work, an honor that someone like yourself could never fully appreciate. You’ve put doubt in him,” he said again, “and he does not yet understand how dangerous that is. He’s forgotten how dangerous you can be. He thinks he has... domesticated you. He thinks he can keep you here forever. He thinks... the harm that you are capable of is all behind you. But I know better. The fact that he’s now considering to spare your life proves just how formidable you remain.” He uncrossed his legs and leaned forward, now stressing the idea of intimidation. “I can’t have you ruining him, you understand. You are far too inconsequential to bring him down, and I won’t allow the attempt.”

“You’re going to kill me?” Matt inferred.

Wesley stood and calmly buttoned his jacket. “No,” he said. “No, I’m not going to kill you, not personally. I really hope it doesn’t come to that. No, I just have to remind him how much he wants you dead. He’ll give the order,” Wesley assured himself.

“All I tried to do was save people,” Matt said, justifying everything he ever did against them.

“Protecting them in the interim does not save them,” Wesley argued. “Help one today, two tomorrow, it does nothing. These people are irrelevant to the big picture. Their sacrifice is... regrettable but necessary. Mr. Fisk understands that. He’s a great man. While you are a... child with no vision, and you should have stayed out of his way.”

The next morning, there was a bottle of pills by Matt’s breakfast, but he was uncertain of their intended effect. He could read only a few letters by running his sensitive fingertips over the ink, barely raised above the label. Even if what he guessed at was correct, Matt would not risk swallowing them. Wesley’s contempt hung more like a promise than a threat. He wanted Matt dead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I like to think it’s clear (I have such smart, wonderful readers), but in case it isn’t, the pills Wesley arranged to be given to Matt are the ones that would stop him from going into heat. He wants to keep Fisk away from Matt. So of course Matt isn’t going to take said pills.


	22. Wicked Game

“Finally,” Matt exhaled when the door opened, when Fisk stepped inside. He sat forward, up off the wall he had been leaning against. “Busy with work, fine, but I paged you hours ago.”

He felt irrefutable relief to have Fisk in the room before the full brunt of heat struck. Control over his mind was always stronger when he did not start off already begging.

Matt grabbed the hem of his shirt and began pulling it up over his stomach. Now that Fisk had arrived, there was no reason to wait.

“I thought Wesley handled this.”

Matt let his shirt back down. He moved himself to the side of the bed. His legs hung down and his feet patted the floor. “What, the pills?” he asked. “I can’t read. Do you expect me to take something without knowing what it is?”

“I wouldn’t hurt you,” Fisk swore, “not yet. But these... trysts cannot continue.”

“Why not?” Matt objected. He stood. The width of the room was between them, but he closed it with short steps as he spoke. “It’s about the only damn break I get from listening to four brick walls.”

The truth was if he stopped going into heat, Fisk would stop visiting, and Matt would not risk losing Fisk’s ear, not when Wesley was calling for his execution in the other one. He needed more time with the man. He needed more time to exploit that pale streak of benevolence. Ingratiating himself to Fisk was his best option for survival. Matt knew he could no longer fight his way out, not at eight months pregnant.

“I will get you more books,” Fisk offered instead. He was done.

Matt grabbed his wide wrist, knowing he could not hold the man back unless Fisk allowed it. “You can’t leave,” he said. “I need you.” His breaths were labored from that need. His skin was flushed and warm.

“Take a pill,” Fisk suggested. He pulled his arm away and Matt let go. “You’ll calm down.”

“That could take hours to work.”

“Then you will have your relief at that time,” he said, though he was hesitant in giving the callous decree.

“You’re still going to kill me. Okay,” Matt said. “All right. But all that means is this could be my last chance to have sex.”

“You want this?” Fisk questioned, determined to make him answer. He put a hand on Matt’s upper arm. He rubbed tenderly. Matt shuddered.

“Yes.”

“I don’t.” Matt could not tell if Fisk was lying. His own blood pumped too loudly in his ears. “Compensate me.”

“I’ll make it feel good,” Matt promised, debasing himself to fulfill a desperation that was twofold: survival and heat. “I won’t complain. I won’t...” What was there? “I’ll- I’ll say whatever you want.”

“No,” Fisk refused. “It’s not enough.” Matt choked down the whine in his throat. He possessed nothing and thus had nothing to give. But Fisk already knew what he wanted. It never left his thoughts: Matt’s one remaining bargaining chip. “Is the child mine?”

Matt did not answer.

“That’s what I thought,” Fisk sneered.

“No, wait.” To stop Fisk from talking and refusing, to stop him from leaving and closing the door for good, Matt did something drastic. Matt kissed him.

They never kissed. They had not since the day they met, the day they conceived their son. It was the surprise of it, the reawakened presence of it, that caused Fisk to stall in action. But when thought came back to him, he pushed Matt away, disgusted and angered.

“Wesley was right,” he said.

“No.”

“You would use me.”

“No.”

“Manipulate me!”

“No!”

“Kiss me!” Fisk yelled. “You kiss me... You play with my mind as if it were your own personal toy. And all to save your pathetic skin. Where is your pride?”

“Gone,” Matt answered. It was almost the truth. “I’m dying. I have... a month to live. Emotions like pride, resistance... hatred... they’re the first things to let go. I would waste time and energy I don’t have keeping them intact. I’d rather enjoy what I can from the last few weeks of my life. I want to have sex again; I love sex. I want to kiss _knowing_  it’s my last. I want to talk until I run out of things to say. I want...” He sighed. “I want to not be alone.”

“We are... all... alone,” Fisk said. “Don’t let presence of company convince you otherwise.”

“Will you stay?” Matt boldly pleaded, needing Fisk to do so for his own selfish reasons, his own preservation. “We can be alone together.” He smiled, a defeated and desperate emotion, a perfect act. “And have a little fun with it.”

Fisk swallowed. It was loud. Matt thought even a normal person would have heard that gulp. The man frittered time between the present and his decision. He was hesitant. He was afraid of unfathomable consequence.

He took a step closer, his unspoken, consenting reply.

Fisk was looking at him. That much was obvious from the angle at which his head rested. The roving direction of his eyes, however, was not something Matt could discern. Fisk looked upon him, and Matt had no idea what he saw.

The man bent forward, and intent became obvious again. They kissed, only that time Fisk initiated. He believed Matt’s beseeching appeal for companionship and intimacy.

Matt pressed forward until his pregnant stomach impeded him. He participated in his first mutual kiss in months. It was reserved at first, wary of a tenderness that never should have existed between them again. Matt opened his mouth, pushing things along, rushing his looming urgency.

Fisk picked him up, holding Matt in his arms. To him, Matt’s extra weight was as nothing. He had no trouble. He might have carried it better, with less stress on his body, but that was not their lot in life.

The bed never felt so soft beneath him. Matt never laid in it so gently, so slowly, as when he was placed in its middle. Fisk took his lips away, his body away. He stood to undress. Matt pulled off his own shirt. He kicked away his pants. There was a thrill he had not experienced in months. He felt hasty. He felt like they were being naughty, doing something impulsive, something they should not. It was most like the spontaneity of their first time together, though there was enough ill will between then and now to weight them with the dissimilarity. What they were doing was entirely new.

Matt waited for the unprecedented.

Fisk climbed onto the bed slowly, wading into still water he was cautious against disturbing. They each understood how fragile and how delicately balanced the situation was. Matt greeted him with a timid grin and reaching hands that pulled the man down, down over him. Their breath was so heavy for it to only be the beginning. Fisk kissed him. He pulled away and tried to speak, but hesitance brought only an exhale between them. Matt kissed him. Their lips came together and drew apart. They used the break to talk themselves out of what they were doing but ignored reason by the end of it. Matt was less uncertain, more determined. He would abuse the opportunity reaped from Fisk’s doubt.

Hands touched bare bodies. Matt touched Fisk as he had not since their first time together. He felt that tired face whose burdens he now knew. He let his fingers spread across Fisk’s shaven head. It was so smooth, so soft. It felt good.

“Please,” Matt asked, turning his head to say it. He rested his cheek against Fisk’s and spoke in his ear. “Please, I... I need— I...” He was hot and wanting.

“Yes,” Fisk whispered. He kissed. “Of course, Matthew.”

Matt tried to roll over in the small space he had, but a hard, strong hand grabbed his knee and stopped him.

“No,” Fisk said, but it was not an order. He was asking, requesting. Matt had a choice, and Fisk conveyed that in the way he spoke. “Let me...” He kissed Matt’s jaw. One hand moved up Matt’s thigh. The other one pulled through his hair. “Let me see you.” It was a longstanding desire the man had never forced the fulfillment of. He asked for it now, in a time when things might be different.

Matt tilted his head and gasped as Fisk lavished his sensitive neck with kisses. His fingers twitched and his toes clenched when the man bit. “Okay,” he uttered, giving permission to remain in the position they were in. “Okay, Wilson. Okay. We can...”

Matt had never engaged in sex with a man while facing him. It was different. It was not the bad kind of different.

He picked his hips up higher off the bed, and Wilson pushed inside him. “Mm, yes,” he moaned. “Keep going.” He kept either hand around Fisk’s neck or shoulder. Matt felt comforted and not alone to finally hold onto something that was not a bed sheet, or a pillow, or his own arm. He could hear Fisk’s heart beating right in front of him. The sound was soothing, and Matt recognized it as the constant it had always been during sex. He let his hand wander and settle over the bare skin of Fisk’s chest, above that thumping heart.

“Open your eyes,” Fisk asked. Matt was not aware he closed them. “Let me see.”

Matt did as requested and opened his eyes. He felt exposed and vulnerable, preyed upon by something so innocent as sight. Fisk loved his vacant eyes. He loved to see but not be seen. He kissed Matt.

Chemistry, physical compatibility, was the one thing they never lacked. While Matt and Fisk had become very experienced together, they now ventured into something new. There was self-consciousness, but they overcame it. They moved in unison, bodies and lips. They were good together, in this if nothing else. What a wasted plain to unite upon in agreement. All the good they could have accomplished together, the city they could have changed, and they quarreled on all but sex.

Fisk found his rhythm and was enthusiastic within it. Matt put a hand to his pregnant stomach, holding it as still as he could against the thrusts which moved him. The fingers of his other hand dug into the pillow by his head, clutching and twisting. His knees rubbed over Fisk’s hips, opened wide enough to let the man between them, clenched tight enough to make sure he did not go anywhere.

Matt gave up pretending he did not enjoy sex with Fisk. He moaned and yelled like the wanting omega he was, the omega he allowed himself to be. “Mm,” he sighed, “so good. You’re so good. Keep going.” Each push knocked a sound out of him. “Uh... uh... uh,” he panted. He pulled Fisk down over him for a kiss, knowing but not caring that the angle was difficult for the man as he tried to fuck, and kiss, and not press too heavily against Matt’s stomach. Matt crossed his arms behind Fisk’s neck and would not let the man off him. “Knot me, Wilson. Come on. Come on, big boy. Do it.”

Fisk groaned deep, reveling salaciously in Matt’s newest side, a remembrance of the day they met but with all their fire and hatred in between. “You’re so beautiful,” he murmured. It was his infatuated remark spoken long ago, a compliment he never retracted but never again revisited. He brushed Matt’s hair away from his sweat covered face and kissed him, holding him there, making Matt take it as he pushed his knot inside. The angle was inconvenient, but manageable. Matt was good at taking a knot now. He was good at taking Fisk’s knot. His body had been remade around the man.

“Oh, god, yes!” Matt shouted. He pulled an arm from around Fisk’s neck, but the man touched him first, jerking Matt’s cock, assisting in a way he never had. Matt held onto Fisk’s shoulders, squeezing tightly with his fingers, scratching with his nails. He came. “Oh god.” He fell hard against the bed.

Fisk pulled his hand away slowly. He touched Matt lower, tracing along the stretched, stuffed rim of his ass. It felt so good, but it was too much.

“Please,” he asked, “I’m too sensitive for that. Please, Wilson.”

Fisk obligingly took his hand off Matt. He wiped his fingers on the sheets and used his arm to keep himself pushed up off the body below him. He stared down at Matt.

They caught their breath between indulgent kisses, knowledgeably taking advantage of that one aspect of intimacy they had neglected for half a year.

“Is it bad strategy,” Matt panted, “to tell the enemy... that you like having sex with them?”

“Yes.” It was, of course. Matt knew the answer when he asked. “I... enjoy it as well.”

They were both bad strategists.

“I have,” Matt confessed. He stopped kissing Fisk and moved the man’s head down, placing it on his shoulder, caressing the smooth skin as he spoke. “Ever since the first time... in my apartment, in the middle of the afternoon. It was good.”

“Yes.” The word rumbled against Matt’s shoulder and vibrated on the skin.

There were so many unpleasantries between then and now, so many rounds of sex they did not enjoy and would have forgone if they could. That first day, however, it was simple. It was an uncomplicated rush from two surprisingly compatible strangers. It ended in disaster. It sentenced them to where they were. But there was something about the day they met. It was untouchable.

“Did that...” Fisk began to ask, but he was unsure where the new line of concern had been drawn. He did not know where they were or what emotions he was allowed to display. That made two of them. “Your back,” he said instead. “How’s your back?”

“It’s okay,” Matt said. “I’m okay.” He tensed his back, trying to force muscle to support the aching spine beneath his stomach. He did hurt, and yet he did not regret the position. “I’ve never done it like that before,” Matt admitted. He grinned. “I liked it. It was hot.”

Fisk pulled away from Matt’s shoulder and kissed his forehead. He situated them a little better, onto their sides, and Matt was more comfortable after he draped his leg over the man’s hip, accommodating a better angle for the knot in him. Fisk’s arm curled around and held his lower back like a steady, pressing weight. His other hand was between them. For the first time, he was feeling below and above. He felt the baby, and he felt Matt.

“Look at me,” Fisk said— implored.

Matt chuckled. “Is that a joke or...” He did not taunt Fisk further. He knew the man’s interest and was of no current mood to deny it. Matt blinked his sightless eyes and looked Fisk in the face. They shared an unrequited stare. The intensity could be felt. “I’m beautiful?” he said, reminding Fisk of the compliment he let slip. Matt was not entirely deprived of kind words, nor was he a glutton for them, but hearing Fisk’s unreserved praise did flatter and pleasure.

“Yes.”

Matt kissed him, chaste and light, tender. If only everything could be so easy, he lamented. If only debates came around and were resolved with the second nature of sex. If only they were complacent men who closed their eyes and ears to the city. If only Matt were not imprisoned by Fisk. If only what they just did changed anything between them.

“It’s yours,” Matt said, a confession that was reluctant and whispered. “The baby, he’s yours. There was no one after you and no one before you for a mile. It’s yours. You’ll know soon enough, so there’s really no point in dragging it out. You should be able to be... excited for it.”

“Excited,” Fisk repeated the word, philosophizing its simple concept, “is not how I feel... not anymore.” He dreaded the day, not so deeply as Matt, but he did not look forward to what it meant. As Wesley divulged, Fisk did not want to kill him. It was the doubt Matt needed, planted in that mind successfully.

“Still,” he said, “I thought you should know.”

In Fisk’s eyes, it was Matt’s last stand. He forfeited the now cheap victory. It cost nothing for him to give, and he had held onto the secret long enough. Surrender benefited him more. Fisk would consider him truly beaten, docile, submissive. The man had nothing to fear from him.

“Thank you for telling me. Your honesty means a... a great deal.”

“Yeah.”

Fisk kept him in a tight embrace, possessive but not controlling, not imprisoning. There was not an inch between them if it could be prevented. It was hot skin on hot skin. Matt laid there and allowed it. Human contact was nice. Fisk smelled good. He smelled of that expensive cologne, perfectly distributed. He smelled of soap and clean sweat. He smelled like traces of the outside world.

Matt tucked his head against Fisk’s chest— against his heart— and rested his hand on the man’s arm, petting and squeezing occasionally.

When he was done, Fisk rolled Matt onto his back and pulled out slowly, considerately. “How was that?” he asked. “Are you... through?”

“I could go again,” Matt said, “one more time.” The worst was behind him. He could manage the end alone, but he needed Fisk to stay, especially when he was in such an agreeable mood.

“Rest first,” Fisk said, though Matt knew it was for his own benefit. He was not so young anymore, and not even an omega in heat could get him ready again so soon after. They always rested between.

Fisk sat up and leaned against the brick wall. Matt could sense it cooling his back, equalizing the temperature between one and the other. He himself remained lying down, passively trying to keep what Fisk had spent inside of himself and off the sheets.

“I hate these cotton sheets,” he said, smalltalk, pillowtalk. “They grate against my skin. I have to sleep as still as I can.”

“You would have fine silks instead?” Fisk retorted. It was not mocking. Matt heard his smile.

“If you’re offering,” he joked.

“I would... lay you on the softest silks,” Fisk narrated, voice far away in thought, “recklessly expensive. Soft silks on a soft bed. And you would want for- for nothing. I would shield... you from knowledge of an ugly world, so you felt no duty to protect it.”

It was a fairytale that placed Matt on a shelf where he would be revered and confined. The idea of it would never function outside of words, but it was a nice picture Fisk envisioned, nicer than what Matt was currently reduced to.

“In another life,” Matt stated, placing the divide between those two existences: reality and fiction. He knew what Fisk intended with his promises. He knew the limitations of such kindness, already broken by the past they harbored.

“Yes,” he quietly said, “had you not... interfered.”

“Had you been more considerate of those innocent people you stepped on.” Matt shook his head. Fighting was his first instinct, but there was no gain to be taken from it. “There’s nothing about it that can be changed now.” He reached out, sensing and feeling until he found Fisk’s hand. “I can’t do anything but speak. It’s your world now, Wilson, yours to fix.”

Fisk turned his hand over and held Matt’s. “I try to minimize it,” he said. “The damage, I try to... I do not want to hurt civilians. Even your Mrs. Cardenas,” Fisk was cautious in mentioning her, “I tried to pay her first. I wanted... to pay her, everyone. I do this for them.”

Matt nodded his head. He almost believed it. In fact, he believed it more than he did not. Fisk certainly bought into his own dogma. It was his methodology which pitted them against one another.

They went again when they were ready.

Fisk held him. He raised Matt from the rough sheets and kept his arms across Matt’s back, separating him from them instead of pushing him down into the bed they covered.

They kissed as if the sex were normal. They touched as if one were not prisoner and the other warden. They laid as if it were a sunny afternoon.

But all things must end, even a magnificent breakthrough that gave better hope than Matt had seen in months.

Fisk kissed his forehead after he left the bed, before he dressed. Matt grabbed his hand, his hold light and entreating.

“Stay,” he asked.

“I can’t. I have... business to attend to.” He kept its nature vague.

Matt dared not press the matter. He was playing the long game, and suspicion had already been introduced as an unwanted participant.

“Don’t be a stranger.”

Fisk did not gift him silk sheets. Matt did not expect him to. Such doting generosity only existed in a universe separate from their own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *plays Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game” in the background*
> 
> They’ve been having sex since the first chapter, but there’s something so satisfying about this one, isn’t there? Real breakthrough.
> 
> I like Fisk picking Matt up. Because he is so damn strong. Like really, really strong. It’s unclear how much of his strength transferred over from the comics, but never forget he was bench pressing something like 500 pounds right before talking to Frank in prison. I enjoy depicting him picking Matt up like it’s nothing because Fisk can legitimately pick Matt up like it’s nothing, even though Matt is pure muscle and no doubt heavy himself. I find this fact very pleasing. Fisk being so big and strong is probably the second biggest kink I have with this ship. With the first being all that beautiful damn dialogue.


	23. Five Minus One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should, perhaps, express my apologies. This is the last chapter I have finished. Well, I have another, but it’s not the next one. The next chapter is mostly finished, but it keeps getting longer. Also I’ve become a little distracted writing fanfiction for this new show. (It’s called Timeless, and you should watch it. Please?)
> 
> Anyway, maybe expect further delays between updates. But I will finish. I promise. No worries there.

They continued having sex. Matt suspected Fisk kept it secret from Wesley— for as long as he was able.

“That day,” Fisk spoke, “the day when we- when we met... you touched my face. You felt me.”

“Yes.” Matt remembered. Fisk had insisted on it.

“Was it necessary?”

“I can still see,” Matt said, “just not with my eyes. I use my other senses to create an image of the world. Touch is one of those four senses, so yes.” He nodded his head. It rubbed against Fisk’s arm that he was using as a pillow. “Touching helps. It’s not always necessary, but sometimes it, uh, adds another layer.”

Fisk’s hand twitched against Matt’s side. The fingers tapped. He was anxious. He was hesitant. “May I?”

“You want to touch my face?” Matt responded with a chuckle. “You can see.”

“Yes, in the standard way,” Fisk said. “But now it feels... close-minded by comparison. Being... with... you makes me question my dependence. I rely so heavily on sight, but it is only one of five.”

“It’s not dependence,” Matt quibbled. “It’s using what you have. If I could see, I wouldn’t shut my eyes and grope around in the dark.”

“My apologies.” Fisk could tell he offended Matt. He realized that deliberately closing his eyes, embracing his other senses, was not the same experience as blindness. He was able to see again at the end. “Forget I spoke.”

“No.” Matt reached over and took Fisk’s hand from his side. “If you want to feel, Wilson, you can feel. We both know I couldn’t stop you if I wanted to.”

“Permit me,” he asked. He would not take it by anything akin to force or coercion.

“Touch me.”

Fisk pulled his other arm from beneath Matt’s head. He nervously flexed his fingers, uncertain of how to proceed.

“Close your eyes,” Matt whispered. He did. “Try to forget the visual image you have. Don’t put your hand where you know my jaw will be. Listen to my voice, determine where my mouth is, and... imagine the rest.”

There was so much conceivable strength in Fisk’s hands. It was not present in that moment. Curled fingers touched Matt’s cheek, one hand then the other. The hardness of fingernails raked across his skin until Fisk opened his hand completely. The softness of fingertips followed. Matt felt them prodding his face, discerning the lines, seeing them through a different medium. Fisk touched his evening stubble and examined the coarser texture. He traced the bone of Matt’s jaw up around his ear and onto his cheek. Fisk felt his nose, and his brow, and the closed eyes between them. One thumb brushed along his eyebrow. The other pulled on his lips.

“Touch,” Fisk mindlessly uttered. “And taste.” He kissed Matt. It carried an explorative curiosity but was, in its overall execution, ordinary. They already kissed with eyes closed— even Matt, out of mechanical impulse. Fisk withdrew his tongue from Matt’s mouth, and he wandered with it over the salty skin of his jaw, tracing the path blazed by his fingers. He nibbled on that place beneath the ear, where the tender flesh of neck begins, and Matt could not help his groan, being still in that sensitive place where all actions carried to him a sexual overtone.

“Keep doing that, and we’ll be at this all night,” he warned. He did not care. He would monopolize as much of the man’s time as he was able, even if it left him exhausted.

Fisk made a smirk then closed his mouth around it. Soft lips rested on Matt’s neck. “Smell,” he opened his mouth again to say. He sniffed, pressing his nose into Matt’s neck. He nuzzled, and the delicacy with which he acted might have tickled if it were not eclipsed by its own intimacy.

Matt smelled like whatever cheap soap they gave him. He smelled like sweat and withering pheromones. That was all, or rather that was all he presumed Fisk was capable of discerning. Of all four senses, Fisk lingered in that one for the shortest time. Smell aided Matt, but it was a sense that worked for the average man only on its most accessible plateaus.

“What is it you hear?”

“Your heart,” Matt answered. “I hear it beating in your chest. I can monitor people’s emotions. I can tell if they’re lying.”

He was certain Fisk wanted to listen to his heart, to put his ear over his chest, but they were knotted and Matt’s pregnant stomach was in the way, keeping him from bending too close. There was no good angle for it as they were.

It took Fisk little time to plot his alternative. He put two fingers on Matt’s neck, over the beating thread of his pulse. Matt felt the fingers digging in, pressing in, aligning themselves with the pace of his heartbeat. It sped up immediately.

“Your pulse is quick.”

“Yeah.” Matt swallowed and his neck pushed against Fisk’s thumb. “You have your hand around my throat, and I’m trusting you not to squeeze.” It was not fear which made his pulse skitter. It was preparedness for retaliation.

In Matt’s opinion, the considerate gesture for Fisk would be to remove his hand. He did not. He kept it there, perfectly still, waiting until Matt trusted him, waiting until his heartbeat accepted a normal rhythm.

Matt breathed deeply through his nose. He calmed himself as if through meditation. He let his heart rate descend.

“There,” Fisk said, feeling the slower thump. “There,” he said again, as if he were proving Matt wrong at something, as if being choked were a groundless worry between them.

Fisk tightened his hand, only a little, and Matt’s pulse shot back up. His own hand flexed, anticipating the call to defend. Fisk loosened his grip. He waited for Matt to calm down again.

Fisk kissed him, deeply. Matt’s heart quickened for a different reason, and he saw now that Fisk was playing a game of sorts. The man was monitoring and measuring the effect he had.

“And you do this without touching?” Fisk asked.

“Yes,” Matt answered. “If I focus, I can hear your heart, both our hearts. Yours is slower,” he observed, “because you know what’s going to happen.”

“And the baby’s?”

“Fastest,” Matt said. “It’s small, so it... it beats quicker.”

“I must admit to my jealousy,” Fisk said, “jealousy that you are able to hear it all the time.”

Matt put his hand over Fisk’s where it still rested on his throat. He tapped his finger against the base of Fisk’s thumb. It was a quick rhythm, evenly spaced. “That’s it,” he said. “That’s what it sounds like. That’s our baby.” It was Matt’s newest tactic to use words which encompassed them both. They were a unit which shared, and every piece was necessary for a completed picture, a family.

Fisk pulled away from Matt’s neck but not his hand. He held it. He pushed his fingers between Matt’s. The echoed drumming continued on the back of Fisk’s hand. Matt kept it going.


	24. Nothing but the Water

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This accidentally ended up being a kind of long chapter. It just kept going while I was writing. But I don’t think anyone’s going to complain about an update bigger than 1k. Haha.
> 
> I think as soon as I get the time, I’m going to sit down, marathon a little DD, reread this entire fic, and then hammer out the ending. As soon as I get the time.

Matt washed his hair, spreading shampoo to the ends, scrubbing his scalp of the nearly dried sweat. He rinsed. The cleanliness he felt from his routine shower after sex was almost as good as the sex itself. It erased the filth and the creeping sensation of disgust.

He brought his head out from beneath the shower’s spray. “I don’t suppose you could bring condoms next time?” he suggested. “It might make things... cleaner.”

“I like to feel you,” Fisk responded, saying it from nearer than anticipated. He was only a few feet away, and his progression to that point was something unnoticed.

Matt did not like the crippling effect that came with showering. The flow was loud in his ears. The water was distracting on his skin. Smells were blocked.

He went back to bathing, pretending Fisk’s incidental stealth had not surprised him. He maintained a better vigilance when the man came up behind him. Matt focused to keep himself from being startled. Fisk was there, behind him, and impossible to ignore. He stepped closer, into the radius of the shower. It wetted his front.

Fisk took Matt’s rag from him, gently tugging it between his fingers. Matt let it go but twisted around to follow, curious of his intent. “Turn around,” Fisk murmured. Matt returned to his position facing the wall. Fisk washed his back. He dragged the cloth over his shoulders, across his scars, and down his skin. Matt truly enjoyed the stimulation of outside touch. The nerves shivered long after Fisk moved on. He washed Matt’s sides and spread his fingers as he rubbed the washcloth against Matt’s belly. “I’ve noticed other people,” Fisk spoke in his ear, “women and men. Your stomach... it isn’t as pronounced as theirs.” In his constant mental preoccupation with Matt’s pregnancy, Fisk had taken to comparing him to other people whom he observed. Matt did not doubt he looked different.

“I don’t think it’s a bad sign,” he replied. “I’m healthy. Our baby’s healthy. The only weight I’ve gained is him.” Fisk’s hand continued to move over his unimpressive stomach, not washing, only feeling. “Or do you wish I’d gotten fat?”

Fisk clearly wanted him bigger, rounder, but he dismissed Matt’s assertion that it was the truth. “You look fine.”

“And, being blind, obviously I have to take you word for that,” Matt said with a brief chuckle. He moved further back, resting his weight against Fisk. “I read that a lot of people, men and women, don’t show as much with their first pregnancy. It would probably be more apparent with a second child, but I...” He stopped talking. Fisk’s hand stopped moving. They had been avoiding the topic of his impending death. Matt liked bringing up the reminder, but he believed Fisk resented him for it.

“Perhaps,” was all he said. His hand resumed movement.

Matt practically purred. He did sigh with contentment. “I wish I had a bathtub,” he mused. “I feel sore all the time— all the time. I would really... really enjoy a long soak. I’d make the water hot— too hot really, to the point where I could barely stand it.”

“No,” Fisk said, answering as if Matt were earnestly requesting one be installed. “A hot bath could be bad for you.”

Matt laughed. “I see you’re reading those books as well.” The image of it amused him.

“Yes.” To Fisk, reading about pregnancy was an obvious and shameless thing to do. He was not embarrassed by it.

“Why...” Matt had trouble asking the question whose answer he could not fathom, could not even guess at. “Why do you want a baby so badly?”

The response was simple. It was humanizing. “I am a man,” Fisk said. “I want what all men want. I want... friends, children... love.” He rested his cheek against the top of Matt’s head. The water hit at him, but he did not seem to notice. “You had a life outside of the Devil. You had friends, a job. Do you honestly believe that I am nothing more than the man at the top of the pyramid?”

“I know people care about you.” He knew of at least two, Vanessa and Wesley. “I think you want another one.”

“You’re wrong,” Fisk told him, “or rather you have it backwards. What I want is someone to care for.” Fisk had nothing but love and concern for those who mattered to him. Matt knew he would protect and care for their baby as well as any man could for his child. Those were his intentional plans. It was all the unexpected incidents Matt worried about, not to mention the scheduled one of his own death. That remained a threat to be feared.

Matt did not comment on Fisk’s desire. He did not say Fisk would be a good father or a bad one. What mattered was he wanted to be one. He did. And in almost two weeks, he would be.

Matt turned around where he stood and Fisk let him. He took back his rag and lathered it with soap so that he could return the gesture and wash down Fisk’s chest. Matt moved the cloth around in small, wandering circles, ridding Fisk of sweat and foreign smells. When Matt moved up to his neck, Fisk tilted his head to one side, making it more accessible. Matt’s thumb stroked the man’s jaw as his fingers lightly scrubbed, not accomplishing very much at all. Fisk did not mind. He was too absorbed in being touched so softly and so willingly. He never bathed before leaving anyway. What Matt did was nothing but an extra service.

“I smell you,” Fisk muttered. His head was still angled away from Matt. He spoke to the ceiling. “When I leave, you are on my skin. It seeps... into my clothing. It doesn’t leave. I wash. When I return home, I wash. I have my suits, my shirts dry-cleaned. And for a little while, you’re gone.” He sounded so tired, near exhausted, when he said, “And then you call again.”

Matt knew he held the mercy that would free them both. He refused its treatment. “I don’t want to take the medicine.”

“I know.” Fisk bent his head down and kissed Matt’s neck. He walked them backwards, into the shower and up against the wall. “I know.” He sucked and it felt good. Matt grunted at the first bite and put a hand out to steady himself against the brick.

“Wil... Wilson,” he uttered. With heat only just behind him, his skin was still so sensitive, more so than its normal heightened state. It felt so good. Matt kept his lips open in a moan and his mouth filled with water. He spat.

Fisk knelt in front of him, putting his knees into the shallow puddle of water. He placed his hands on Matt’s legs and encouraged him to spread them apart, to brace himself better. Matt went along with the request. Fisk took the washcloth again and pulled it down Matt’s thighs, cleaning already clean flesh. He leaned forward and used his teeth, biting tenderly, evocatively. His mouth moved further in, taking on softer, more sensitive skin. Matt hummed in his throat and fell the last few inches until he hit brick, letting it support him. Fisk’s hand was so strong on the back of his leg as it held him still. He bit. He bit Matt’s inner thigh.

“Wilson.” Matt exhaled the name. Fisk went higher and he groaned. “What... What are you...”

“Shh,” Fisk ordered, whispering it against Matt’s hip. The warmth of his breath could not be felt above the trickle of water. The entire situation was unusual and unsettling. Matt tried to move and was held still. Fisk had no plan but would keep Matt there until he deciphered his own thoughts.

He mouthed and nibbled against Matt’s skin. The attention felt better than the stimulation, though both were enthralling. He moaned. The shower head thundered in his ears. The water ran all over his body and was distracting but did not distract.

Matt was sensitive from heat but no longer a prisoner to it. What he felt was all his own. What actions Fisk committed were his.

Willingly, deliberately, Fisk touched Matt’s cock. He used a severe absence of strength, soft but still firm enough for pressure. He moved his large, grasping hand, pulling to the end before going back up, repeating the pattern. Matt breathed through his mouth, just far enough out of the shower to not fill with water when he opened it. By Fisk’s design and through the receptiveness of a post-heat state, Matt got hard. It was different than every single erection he had been having for months. Those were incidental to his condition, but this? This was a conscious effort towards pleasure, not water on the fire. It felt so good. It was so good, so great to be the center of attention and have participation come freely, not desperately. It got better.

Fisk’s mouth was so hot. Matt whimpered and his knees went weak. He had not been expecting that. The shower and the situation had thoroughly distracted him from Fisk moving in. Matt tried to keep still, to let Fisk work, to prevent him from changing his mind about what subservience he was committing. That was difficult when the man’s efforts were so unexpectedly good.

“Have you done this before?”

Fisk did not answer, but Matt knew he was either skilled or gifted. The man had great potential to be a wonderful, attentive, pleasing lover. He rarely tapped into it with Matt. What they did was about getting off, no extra effort required or expected.

He was good, and Matt was vocal about just how much he agreed with the treatment. Fisk kept his hands gripping firmly on the backs of Matt’s thighs. It was such an unyielding hold— almost painful and disruptive— that Matt could not have gone anywhere if he wanted to. He did not want to. Fisk’s head bobbed in and out, going only as deep as he cared to, in no way pushing himself. Matt wanted everything but would settle for those first few inches. It was more than he ever expected.

The base of Matt’s cock was untouched, only kissed at by Fisk’s open lips. His balls were ignored. It should have been disappointing, but after so many months (closer to a year) of complete neglect but for his or Fisk’s hand, it felt amazing.

“Don’t stop,” he begged, fearing in his mind that it was some new torture, that Fisk would pull away at the last minute. “Please... please don’t stop.” Matt moaned loudly, almost a shout, when Fisk started using his tongue. He went deeper. Matt felt himself at the back of Fisk’s mouth. He knew that was as far as it would go. He accepted that. “You feel so good,” Matt panted. “Don’t stop, Wilson. Don’t... Mm...” He groped wildly with his hands, almost too preoccupied to find the outline of the man. Matt could barely see him. He felt. He followed Fisk’s arms with an erratic, patting movement. He traced down the hard muscle until he could grab Fisk’s shoulders and hold on. He just held on. “Right there, Wilson. Right there. Don’t stop.” There were a dozen little reasons, a dozen cheats, that made it an unfair fight (post-heat, recent neglect, taboo actions, etcetera and so on), but if asked in that moment, Matt would have shamelessly confessed to it being the best blowjob of his life. “Almost... I’m almost...” He wanted to hold Fisk’s head and force its movement, but he knew the man would not be receptive to that. It was amazing that he carried on selflessly and quietly already. So Matt stood there, held perfectly still, bent unpleasantly against a brick wall in the downpour of a mediocre shower. He stood and experienced what Fisk gave him. “Ah! I’m- I’m...”

Fisk kept his warm mouth around Matt the entire time, taking it all in, but when Matt was finished and soft, Fisk pulled off and spat into the drain. It washed away.

Matt’s legs were weak, but Fisk’s hands on his thighs were a strong brace. He would not fall. Fisk would not let him fall. Matt caught his breath. His body tried to steady itself, but his head remained unstable. It did not come down from euphoria. He worried, for a moment, that they triggered another heat, but that was not it. His mind was aroused but remained his own. Fisk’s body was aroused physically. He let go of Matt’s legs and climbed up his body. He leaned into him. They kissed. It was dry lips, a wet tongue, a sour taste, and a hard cock thrusting up against his hip.

They only had sex one time before his heat ended, so Matt was not entirely opposed to the suggestion. In fact, in the moment, in his current mindset, it sounded like such an incredible idea. “Do it,” he permitted. “Do it, Wilson. Come on.”

It was only fair, and it was, by all accounts, getting off easy compared to a blowjob. Matt was so used to Fisk’s cock that taking it had become his second nature. If he had been counting every time they fucked— if he could even remember every time— Matt would estimate the number rounded up to one hundred instead of down to zero. This he could do. It was better, easier, than trying to fit the man in his mouth. Matt was less generous in that respect. He was more willing to commit to their custom, to fall into the routine of letting Fisk do all the work. And he did.

Fisk kissed and bit Matt’s lip then jaw before landing on his neck. He buried his face into the tender skin and let his teeth rest on Matt’s pulse. It was an open mouth, an empty threat, a danger of biting and tearing without the follow-through. Fisk moved his hands across Matt’s stomach, over his sides, and around his thighs again. He picked him up. Matt went so easily, like he weighed nothing. His feet lifted off the concrete floor. His body was in Fisk’s mighty hands. Being manipulated as he was, losing choice, having it taken, it was seductive. Matt enjoyed it. He would not apologize or feel shame because of that.

“How the hell are you this strong?” Matt rhetorically asked, exhaling it over Fisk’s shoulder. He did not care about the why of it. All that mattered was if the man could keep it up.

Fisk’s teeth scraped Matt’s skin as his mouth closed shut. “This is what you wanted,” he uttered. He kissed Matt’s neck. “Do you remember? You wanted me to hold you up, to take you against the wall.”

“Yes,” Matt groaned. He remembered. He remembered how badly he wanted that. “Do it.” He tried to help, to lean more into the wall, to spread his legs wider, but every position was a bad one when pregnant. Not far enough was as far as he could push himself, and he would pay for his efforts later.

Fisk held him with such ability and strength Matt could not fear falling. Fisk would never drop him. Matt helped with the effort. He bent forward as much as he could and used his free hands to take Fisk’s cock and guide it into him.

“Go,” he said. “Move. Do it. Do it, Wilson.”

Fisk brought his body forth, pressing Matt further against the wall and pushing his held length into him. It was not the best angle. It was not even a good angle. A bed was still the best place for sex. But they had been there, and they had done that. Up against the wall was more mental pleasure than physical. It was something new. It was Matt being completely supported. It was Fisk supporting him absolutely. It was a new manner of inescapable cage. It was a new control. They embraced and relished in that motif of submission and dominance their brains so often led them to.

“Mm,” Matt drawled as Fisk lowered him, “yes. Just like that, Wilson. Just like that.” Fisk was inside, so Matt took his hand away. He reclined back against the wall and Fisk took over. He moved deeper into Matt, pushing himself into that hole which had once been so tight but had since been remade around him, for him.

“You feel,” Fisk muttered against Matt’s shoulder, sounding out of breath at the beginning. “You feel so good.” The mindless comment was hushed. Matt could barely discern the words over the still pelting shower that slapped drops against Fisk’s back. “So good, Matthew.” He seldom spoke when they fucked, and their current round was no extraordinary exception. He went quiet again but for those throaty grunts and growls. He dropped Matt low enough that his hips could do all the work. Fisk fucked him up against the wall, shoving the bones of Matt’s sore back and hips into hard brick with every cycle. Discomfort was inconsequential. Matt could take worse. He had taken worse. At least sex came with the benefit of pleasure. Matt moaned for Fisk and called to him. He enjoyed it, the thrust of the man’s cock in and out.

“Look at me,” Fisk said. “Look at me. Look at me, Matthew.”

Matt rolled his head against the brick wall and pulled it up. He opened his eyes and directed them right at the man. Fisk stopped moving. He stared at him, almost through him. Sometimes Matt was grateful to be blind. He did not know if he could otherwise bear the intensity of that look. It was intimidating enough without sight. Fisk closed his eyes and kissed Matt. Content with his momentary indulgence, he began moving again, thrusting into Matt again.

“Oh, god! Damn it! Right there, Wilson, yes.” Matt did not know what to do with his hands, so he let them rest on Fisk’s broad shoulders as the man kept entering him at the precise angle requested. “I’m almost... Right there. A little more, Wilson. A little—” Matt did not get hard again so soon, but he had a dry orgasm, which was almost as good. It left him feeling blissful and exhausted, pleasantly so, the good kind of tired, the boneless kind. But Matt did not need strength in and command of his limbs when Fisk held him like he was. He rested like a limp doll in his arms as the man rutted inside of him, nearing his own ending.

“Not inside. Not inside,” Matt urged. He smirked. “I just... showered.”

As his penance, as a lesson which had since been learned, Fisk obeyed. He overcame the weakness he could not more than eight months ago and resisted knotting Matt. He pulled out.

“Come here,” Matt said. Fisk dropped him a little lower and he grabbed that hard, aching cock which had been denied its prize. Matt pumped his hand up and down the intimidating length of it, so different than his own. His fingers rested curiously on the knot and squeezed. Fisk grunted. Matt continued jerking him off, paying special attention to that pulsing knot, until Fisk came with a sigh. It got on him, but it was easier to clean from his hand, stomach, and leg than his insides. Fisk was not done. He kept ejaculating small amounts. Matt let go anyway. He did not want to hold it the entire time. Fisk had orgasmed. That was enough.

They panted great gasps.

Their minds calmed and rationalized.

Fisk gently lowered him onto the floor. Matt stood on his own legs. His mind cleared further. He realized what just happened. The full implications of what they did occurred to him. Matt was speechless, dumbfounded. “What the— What...” He was out of breath. “What the hell was that?”

There was no excuse for it. They had sex. Outside of heat, they had sex. Their justification was removed, and they had nothing to hide behind or blame. By this knowledge they were laid bare, and of it they were ashamed. Fisk said nothing.

Matt stood up straight, and it was the exact wrong movement for his back. He whimpered but tried to turn it into a more manly, less fazed grunt at the end. Fisk still caught on and guessed the cause behind it. He did nothing but tell Matt to get dressed and go lie down. Matt did as ordered. He dried with his towel. He dressed in clean clothes. He reclined slowly into the hard bed he had never cared for. It was preferable to standing any longer.

Fisk remained in the shower. He turned off the hot water and stood under the cold until his knot went down. There was an innate disadvantage to being an alpha. Knotting was dominating and fulfilling. It was intimate. Forgoing the act was dissatisfaction and a knot with no purpose but to go down on its own. In knowing that, Fisk’s obedience to cum outside carried another layer of consideration.

He finished. He turned the water off altogether. Matt’s towel was mostly wet, but Fisk used it on himself. When he got as much benefit from it as he could, he draped the soaking thing across two nails. His clothes clung to his damp skin when he dressed. They would dry.

Fisk sat on the very foot of the bed to put on his socks and shoes. When he stood, he did not leave, and he waited awkwardly at the bedside, thinking of an adequate farewell.

“Stay,” Matt asked of him. He reached until he found Fisk’s hand. He held it.

Fisk was reluctant to concede to the request. He looked over his shoulder at the door. Desperately, he wanted to escape through it. “I have an hour.” There were undoubtedly more productive (or destructive) things to do with the time. He gave it to Matt.

“Come here,” Matt requested, and Fisk laid beside him. It was a novel thing to be in bed with their clothes on. It was odd in a pleasant and endearing way.

They did not talk. If there were subjects for them to speak on, they were slow in coming to mind. The only awkwardness came from acknowledgement of the silence and yet not the silence itself. After all they had done together, they were comfortable in each other’s presence. Fisk had seen Matt at his worst, as no one else ever had. That was not without consequence. So they laid in a quiet that became easier with the passing minutes. Fisk looked at him. Fisk touched him, rubbed his stomach, their child. It was serene.

Then there came a squeezing lash of pain. Matt made an involuntary whine he could not stop. His fists clenched.

“What’s wrong?” Fisk asked. He looked Matt over for any visible sign of distress.

“It’s nothing. I’m fine,” Matt said. He breathed through it. “I still get those, uh...” The hair on his arms stood. His eyes squinted shut. “I get those cramps, you know. Will... get them until the end. I’m lucky like that.” Matt’s pregnancy had nothing but normal complications; however, some of those were bad enough in their own right.

“Is there anything that helps?” Fisk asked, trying to be supportive.

Matt shook his head. “It’ll go away—” He tensed. The false contractions gave him unwanted pain and chills, but he managed as long as he kept completely still. “It’ll stop in a minute.” Fisk rubbed the raised hairs on his arm. He grabbed Matt’s balled fist and pried it open to be held. Matt squeezed his hand. It was a distraction, and Fisk was more than capable of handling however much pressure he exerted. It helped.

They said nothing until it ended.

“I’m okay,” Matt said. He took a deep breath and let it out. “It’s fine now.” Fisk continued holding his hand, in case they came back. Matt kissed him. He turned onto his side and kissed Fisk’s mouth, then his cheek, then the collarbone behind his slightly unbuttoned shirt. Matt rested there. He pushed his head up against Fisk’s breast and listened to his heart. It was comforting in the same way Matt’s books said his was to the baby. Such a steady, calming rhythm could be nothing but relaxing. Matt enjoyed Fisk’s heart, that repeated tempo which did not change until the minute before he began talking. Disturbing silence was stressful sometimes. Certain subjects were worse about it.

“Have you ever been in love?” Fisk asked. It was little wonder why the issue made his heartbeat quicken. Matt could not guess his exact motivation behind the question. Perhaps Fisk was curious— or jealous. Perhaps he wanted to know if Matt had experienced the sensation of it before he died.

“Uh, once,” Matt said. “She was...” He huffed a sigh and it bounced off Fisk’s chest to blow back in his face. “A piece of work. Bad news, bad... morals. I was drawn to her, inexplicably, because I knew I shouldn’t be. Maybe I just wanted to rebel against my own principles, my own inhibitions. It was liberating. It was... It was me wanting to be different, for her. I wanted to be someone else. I wanted to be selfish. It was so damn tempting, so beautiful, so easy— too easy. I thought I could let myself go. I thought I was wrong about myself, that I wasn’t who I thought I was. I was what she thought, what she knew. I was going to fall for her. I was going to live my life for her. Marry her, have kids, all that shit people do. But she wanted... too much. Where she went was too far. I couldn’t follow. I couldn’t kill. I couldn’t... Not for myself, not even for her. We were too different after all. She couldn’t make me bad. I couldn’t make her good. The relationship died at a standstill.” Matt paused. It had been a long time since he thought about Elektra. Now, he was reminded of her. Not from the conversation, no. That was only the spark, the match. The fire had been burning him the whole time. He was reminded of her. His observation was unasked for and could not be fully appreciated without a working knowledge of all three parties. He said it anyway. “You make me think of her. We’re drawn to each other, Wilson. We are. Like our skin is... magnetized by opposing polarities. And it is just as unexplainable. You know it’s true. I do. It’s there. And it will end in the same damn stalemate. Because you can’t change me. And I can’t change you.”

Fisk took a deep breath so that he might shove aside the comparison of himself to someone Matt said he loved. He knew Matt’s relationship with her did not carry the same baggage. There was nothing for them but hatred on their worst days and coexistence on their best. They could never love one another. They knew that. “The Chinese have a philosophy,” he said, “yin and yang.”

“Yes,” Matt replied, “I’m aware.” He did not know the full breadth of its teachings, but he knew the basic principle.

“The strongest bonds are- are complimentary,” Fisk said. “We need someone to do what we can’t. We need someone to need us for what they cannot do. We want... to feel useful. You are too good, Matthew. You are too righteous. And you will always- always flock to those you shouldn’t, those people who compliment you. You will do this to feel complete. Lie to yourself— you should, yes— but you want them to do those deeds you can’t. And in return, you will... fall... because you want to stop those people, to change them. You’re pathological.”

“I want to change you,” Matt admitted. His largest priority was changing Fisk’s mind, to dissuade the man from murdering him. It was only a major percentage. The minority of his motivation wanted Fisk but wanted him to be different. Why could he not be different? Why could life never be so easy?

“You’re too late.”

“Am I?”

“Yes.” He would not be convinced otherwise. Matt would not change him. Matt could not change him. “You can’t save me.”

Matt did not ask about his own life, if that was still a cause worth fighting for. He avoided the topic. If it was crossing through Fisk’s mind, he did not want to talk about it either. That was all right. It was better than having him spout the usual death sentence with such surety.

“We don’t have to talk anymore,” Matt permitted. He did not want them to. There were days when Fisk could listen to himself speak for hours, never tiring in his self-righteous words. There were days when he was very reserved and said very little. Those were days of somber contemplation, and he could not keep secret that the emotion which kept him quiet was opposite from the hatred which made him rant. Letting Fisk keep his silence was a good thing.

His hand wandered across Matt’s face and into his hair, down his neck, over his shoulder. Fisk outlined him with a powerful, gentle finger. “You like to talk.”

“We don’t have to,” Matt repeated. “Silence can be just as nice sometimes. It’s... not your words I need, Wilson, just you.” How unintentionally romantic it sounded. “I prefer it to being alone,” he edified.

Fisk hummed in acknowledgement but was silent. His hand caressed Matt’s back in such a tender sway. It had a lulling effect. The tempo was slow and even. He kept perfect time and consistent pressure. It dipped into unintended and unknowing step with his heartbeat, making one lap against two drums from his heart.

Matt did not intend to fall asleep. He was very tired lately, and having sex two times (two-and-a-half times), depleted what energy he had.

+

Fisk’s eyes were watching him. Matt could feel the probing latch of their gaze. He looked at Matt. He looked at him. He surely did so the entire time Matt was asleep because he would not doze off himself.

“You look... peaceful... when you sleep,” he said. “I’ve never seen you look so...” Tenderly, he dragged his fingers across Matt’s cheek.

“It’s been more than an hour.” Matt had no clock for telling time, especially not aurally as he needed, but he was too well rested to be stirring from a power nap.

“I didn’t want to wake you when I left. I know with your- with your hearing you must be a light sleeper. I didn’t want to wake you.”

“It’s no big deal if you did.”

“You need your rest,” Fisk disagreed.

“When you don’t have much else to do besides sleep,” Matt told him, “you find it again pretty easy.” He yawned deeply. He touched Fisk’s arm through his shirt and let it rest there. “But I did- I... found it even easier with you here.”

There was a full minute of silence before Fisk said the inevitable: “I have to go now.” He was past his deadline.

“I know.” The sad truth was, “I like it when you’re here.”

Fisk removed himself from the bed with no last touch or kiss. He clearly regretted having stayed for as long and as dotingly as he did. “I am here more often these days.” Matt’s heats were so close together.

“You are,” he said. “Am I an inconvenience yet, Wilson?”

“You never weren’t,” he quietly replied.

Matt had no response to such a deprecating remark. From the beginning, he had only ever been a means to an end: the child. Every extra effort he requested or required was an imposition. Matt was a drain on Fisk’s resources and his time. There was no debating that, and Fisk would not lie about it. He owed no tact nor sensitivity.

“I’ll see you in three days,” Matt said in adieu.

“Two seems more likely,” Fisk spoke, mindful and pessimistic towards Matt’s progression.

He left.

He returned in two days.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just letting you know Matt’s stomach probably isn’t as big as you’re picturing, despite him being almost full term. Most people... I don’t want to say “let themselves go,” but... indulge (rightfully indulge) when pregnant. But Matt’s been eating very healthy (6/7 of the time) and exercising constantly from boredom and habit. He’s muscular. He’s tall(er than most women). The size of his stomach is sort of bare minimum for baby. He’s still very in shape but for that bump. If you’re having trouble picturing it, maybe google muscular pregnant women. Just have a little bit there in the front, not a big, distended stomach. And apparently Fisk is disappointed by that. Haha.
> 
> Sometimes I think about how much of a bottom Matt is. Like when I’m contemplating the possibility of him dominating Fisk. (Not in this fic, but some other one maybe.) And then I quit trying when I remember the episode where Matt had flashback sex with Elektra, and she was on top doing everything while he just laid there and took it. Hot. The one sex scene of the whole show came in to let us know how much of a bottom Matt Murdock is. Thanks for the image, canon.
> 
> By the way, if you start comparing Fisk and Elektra, you’ll soon realize, “Hey, maybe a relationship between Matt and Fisk could work. Maybe it isn’t an absolute impossibility.” Because Matt has this really amazing character flaw where he overlooks people’s transgressions (up to and including murder) if he cares about them. So... it’s not... not a possibility... in some AU. If Matt can forgive one person who’s been murdering since they were twelve, why not another? As long as Fisk was willing to try and change. All Matt wants is a little effort.


	25. Take Your Medicine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the record, Matt is still manipulating the shit out of Fisk. Everything he says isn’t necessarily true. Note my use of the word “necessarily.”
> 
> The biggest priority of this fic remains Lima Syndrome, getting Fisk to become enthralled by Matt and unable to kill him. But, well, there is some low grade Stockholm Syndrome going on as well. Just a dash. Not enough where Matt will stop trying to fight against Fisk. But enough so that he feels... something unnamable. Some spark they undeniably have. 
> 
> I’ve said it in the fic and it remains true to me: it’s a damn shame they’re enemies.

Lazy kisses traveled across Matt’s neck, lips, cheeks, and forehead. They were gentle and sweet, and he did not mind them, not as he should have. Fisk’s fingers played in Matt’s hair, entangling themselves before combing it back out.

“Your hair is so long,” he spoke, saying it like a surprise, as if he had not personally watched it grow down to tickle Matt’s shoulders.

“No scissors.” Even if he were trusted with a pair, Matt had no confidence in giving himself a haircut.

“It looks good long,” Fisk flattered, complimenting Matt like it was a personal choice.

“It’s annoying.” He placed his hand over Fisk’s. Strands of that long hair rubbed between them. “I think I’d prefer it all just... shaved off, like yours.” Fisk did not respond, but it was obvious he did not care for the suggestion. He liked Matt’s hair at shoulder length. Maybe he imagined it longer still. “I always thought about letting it grow out— even more than this,” Matt said, teasing Fisk with a picture that required more time. “Short hair though, it’s... it’s easier to maintain when you can’t see what you’re doing.”

Fisk moved his hand, and Matt pulled his away. Fisk did not leave his hair alone. He continued brushing it with his fingers. He even added his second hand, moving it from Matt’s bare back. It felt good, that gentle tugging and touching. Every follicle of his sensitive scalp was so alight with the methodical strokes.

“I could have brushed it for you,” Fisk did not say. He did not have to. Matt knew what he was thinking. The man had allowed their rivalry to rot. His mind could not stretch in two ways forever. The only way he could be gentle was to pretend, to think always of the world they did not live in.

When Fisk pulled out after sex, Matt made an involuntary whine, worse than usual.

“It hurt you,” Fisk realized.

“No,” Matt shook his head, “I’m fine, honest.” The truth was it made him feel uncomfortable, but that was not a feat in his current state. Everything hurt in varying degrees.

“You’re very pregnant,” Fisk said, stating the overwhelmingly apparent. “This cannot continue.”

“I know what I can take,” Matt argued. He could not risk the man dropping out of their sessions. Fisk was right where Matt needed him, or he was at least on the cusp of it. He was almost broken of a want— maybe even an ability— to kill him.

“As do I,” Fisk said. “I remember the bloody... massacre of a man you were when I had you brought here. You can take so much, too much. And I cannot let your needs jeopardize our child, not when these... heats of yours are coming so close together.” At every other day, it was almost the unending succession Matt predicted.

“One more time,” he asked, voice stern to demonstrate he was not swayed by heat or emotion. “Please, Wilson.”

“Take your pills,” Fisk said. “Please... Matthew.”

Pressing the matter would do more harm than good, especially if the man resorted to asking so kindly.

“Promise you won’t forget about me until the day it happens,” Matt demanded. “Don’t leave me down here alone.”

“I believe we can go,” he sighed, “one-and-a-half weeks without seeing each another.”

“You can,” Matt said. “I can’t.” Manipulations aside, it was lonely to be stuck in imprisonment. Matt had read all his books— and reread most of them, numerous times. “You are the only person I ever interact with, Wilson.”

Concession was too much like bargaining, which Fisk would not do, not out loud. He reached for the bottle of pills, picking them from their forgotten resting place on the floor by the bed. “One a day,” Fisk said, considerately reading the label for him, “with food.”

“And the visitation?” Matt asked, wanting him to say it out loud.

“I’ll see what I can manage.” Suddenly his schedule was full when sex was canceled, when visiting Matt had no justifiable excuse. But he was not lying. He would come back.

Matt opened his mouth and stuck out his tongue, demonstrating his forfeiture. Fisk swallowed hard and removed the lid of the pill bottle. He placed one on Matt’s tongue and got him a glass of water.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Charlie Cox’s long hair in Stardust though. I’m thinking about it. I was also looking at it periodically while writing this. Do not doubt that the guy’s hair has grown during imprisonment.


	26. Familiarity Breeds

Fisk did not come to Matt’s cell, not for five days. He was apologetic when he did show, though he displayed it through nothing but minute actions and timbre. He came though. He did not lie.

After the cage was opened, Fisk dismissed the man outside the door.

Matt put down his book. He was not ordinarily found in such a relaxed state, and it was a novelty for them. He sat up straighter.

“I don’t, uh,” he laughed, “I don’t have much in the way of furniture, so...” He moved over, offering one side of the bed.

Fisk hung his jacket on a nail and sat down. He was quiet, hesitant, no doubt questioning why he had given in and gone down there.

“He’s kicking,” Matt said, attempting anything to distract Fisk from his thoughts. He laid down to inspire comfort, relaxation, and to give his stomach a better angle to be felt. “Right here.” He grabbed Fisk’s hand and put it on himself.

Fisk exhaled and tension left him. He shuffled in the bed until he was laying on his side, propped up on his free arm. “He’s so strong,” he said with a childlike wonder. The fact was undeniable. Matt could feel those small feet and hands moving inside him and poking out his stomach.

“Strong like his father,” he replied, endearing the man to his title, making him love the sound. “Which is good and bad.”

“Is that in reference to him... or to me?” Fisk asked him, rubbing Matt’s stomach and chasing the fluttering movement inside.

Matt put his hand on Fisk’s face. He tapped the cheek with his thumb. “Little of both,” he said through a somber smile. Fisk’s strength was a great advantage to him but something to be feared by those weaker and opposed to it. Matt never stood a chance against him in close quarters, any place where he could not be evasive. Fisk understood and was perhaps remorseful of the effect he had, but he could not apologize for the circumstance which gave him control of their encounters. It was not a confidence Matt could entirely scorn. Fisk would never come and never stay if he were not arrogantly certain of his superiority. It put him in the room. “You have somewhere to be?” Matt asked.

“Not any time soon,” he said.

“Will you stay as long as you can?”

Fisk did not answer. He would let the situation play out rather than committing himself to one decision. It was better than going back on his word. In a way, Matt respected that, even if the promise of a long stay benefited him better. The best opportunity to increase that time was to engage in Fisk’s favored subject. So Matt obliged.

“I feel like he grew overnight,” he complained, and the last thing he needed was Fisk confirming that.

“You are bigger,” he said. He rubbed his hand over the hard, taut stomach that now had more curve to it. The five day difference was drastic enough Fisk noticed. “He might have... dropped... in preparation.”

Matt’s weight gain remained affixed to the baby’s growth. His stomach was smaller than another person’s might have been. It was all baby. But that baby was growing at a very ambitious rate. “I thought I’d avoid stretch marks,” Matt said. “It’s been slow. He stayed small. Now, all at once, it...” He chuckled. “Well, at least I’m not out on the beach for swimsuit season.” Matt could feel the skin of his stomach stretched thin in descending stripes like a vein. He had done well in dodging the outward change, but that was quickly ended. The baby was large, and his growth was not finished. “If he gets much bigger...”

“You will do fine,” Fisk impulsively assured him. He took Matt’s hand and kissed the back of it in such a natural, affectionate gesture.

“You know I don’t... I don’t want a C-section,” Matt reminded. He could not dissolve the horror of it from his mind, that nightmarish scene of him laying on a bed, cut open, bleeding, dying. He did not want it that way.

“I said I wouldn’t do that to you,” Fisk reiterated.

“But if it’s necessary—”

“Stop.” Fisk would not listen to such worries. He would not plan for them. He knew he could not leave Matt vivisected and bleeding. He knew that. The incision would be humanely treated and closed. Somehow, there existed no doubts over it. However, Fisk did not want to think about what he would do with Matt once he was stitched up. Killing him moments later seemed a waste of medical exertion. Why bother fixing him at all with endgame like that?

“You give the order, you tell me what to do, like it’s easy. But how am I _not_  supposed worry about it?” Matt demanded. “How do I not spend the next few days hoping he doesn’t grow any more?”

“I told you to stop talking about it,” Fisk said one more time. There was an ambiguous threat in his tone of voice. The worst he could do was leave and avoid further discussion of the matter. That was punishment enough. “It is... my concern. You have no say in the matter, Matthew. Worrying over it accomplishes nothing.”

Matt surrendered and nodded his head with a jerking motion. Pursuing a subject which ridiculed Fisk’s weaknesses would only anger him. “Okay, Wilson.” He could not resist the stabbing knife of guilt that would come from uttering, “I trust you.” So he said it. And Matt remained perfectly calm at the man’s side while he tensed up from the sentiment. Fisk’s heart and breath skipped. His hand twitched and the nails scratched as they withdrew into his palm. Matt suspected the words even made his stomach sour over with nausea.

“Why?” Fisk asked so softly. A person with weaker hearing might not have caught it. Fisk was perfectly aware and ashamed of the fact that Matt had no reason to place faith in him. He was going to kill him after all. “Why do you trust me?”

“You want me to, don’t you?” Matt said. “You want me to let you handle it. I don’t think you’d ask for my trust so you could betray it. You’re not that kind of man, Wilson.” His methodically chosen words dug the knife in deeper. Matt was good with words. It was why Foggy so often let him do closing arguments in court. When everything was ending, when nothing was left but action, Matt stepped in and spoke. “I trust you, Wilson,” he said again, “and not just because I have to.”

“I don’t want your trust,” Fisk said. It was too much responsibility. Too much strain came with it, piling higher with its complicated weights until the back of the person carrying it broke, snapped.

“Yeah, you do,” Matt contested. Fisk did not argue with him again. He did not argue the truth. Matt put his hand over the man’s where it rested in its forever home against his stomach. He gripped and squeezed with lazy pressure. “We’re in your hands, both of us.”

Fisk could hardly stand it. His teeth clenched tight. His lips trembled and twitched like he could not decide what expression to make with them. “I love my mother very much,” Fisk said, and among the randomness of the statement, Matt did not miss the present tense with which he spoke, the implication that she was still alive. “She’s an omega... like you. I have always thought so warmly and... affectionately of your kind because of her. A weakness perhaps, but it is one I cannot find it in myself to regret.”

“And your father?”

“My mother is a good- good woman,” Fisk insisted. His voice was unstable. “She deserves the... joy of a grandchild.”

“She’ll get it,” Matt promised.

“My father,” Fisk huffed, sounding out of breath somehow. “My father, he hurt her. I watched him hurt her. I watched this man, this... alpha, I watched him hurt _my mother._  And I knew... I knew in watching him that he was... not the sort of man I wanted to be, the kind who... hits women, who hits...” He did not have to elaborate. They both knew what he meant.

“You don’t want to hurt me,” Matt said on his behalf. It was a very bold thing to say, but he was very low on time. “You don’t _want_  to hurt an omega. You’re not your father.” It was true what Wesley said: Fisk had forgotten Matt was dangerous. He was merely an omega, bound and chained with teeth filed and claws cut. He was incapable of damage. He was the gentle parent of Fisk’s child. “You don’t want to hurt me.”

“I don’t,” Fisk confessed, and it was a powerful, treacherous, dangerous secret to admit. It was everything Matt needed to hear. It was everything Fisk never should have told him. “I do not... want to hurt you, Matthew.”

Matt said nothing. He dared not. The road of conversation was narrow. It was slippery. It was unstable and unsupported. Every conceivable peril existed between where he was and where he needed to be.

He put his hand on Fisk’s arm, against the so soft, so tightly woven fabric of his shirt. “What will you do?” he whispered, speaking in a way that would sound like a salve for Fisk’s troubled mind and not concern for his own wellbeing.

“I don’t—” Fisk’s hand shook and his fingers closed tight. “I don’t know!” His fist laid on Matt’s stomach. Matt moved his touch from arm and shirt to straining, twitching hand. Slowly, Fisk let his fingers spread back out. Matt’s calm benefited his temper. “To spare you, to go back on my word, is to dismantle the man that I am, this man who- who understands the importance of smaller sacrifices in service to the higher purpose. But to... kill,” he spoke the word so hushed, as if low volume escaped its wrath and verdict, “to kill you, to harm, to hurt you, I would... In doing _that,_  I turn my back on what made me who I am. I disown what it gave me. I forsake... I forsake my morality. I become the man whom I hate so dearly. I become the man who abuses those he should have protected. I become _the filth_  who puts what I feel above what is right for them. I become someone who hurts for my own satisfaction. I become my father!”

“No,” Matt denied, almost intimidated to speak after such an outburst. “No, Wilson. You’re not your father. You- You try to help people, help them. You don’t want to hurt me. You don’t. It isn’t you,” he said, pushing that idea with a heavy hand.

“Not me,” Fisk mindlessly repeated, taken captive by it. How simple and obvious it all sounded. How sweetly it promised. Spare Matt. Avoid being categorized in any way like his father. Fisk hated the man and what actions he represented. Matt tried to utilize that.

“You’re not your father,” he emphasized. “You’re not, Wilson.” Fisk relaxed by a nearly imperceivable standard. He wanted to believe it so desperately. Matt petted the large hand that rested on his stomach. He rubbed it tenderly with both his hands. “That isn’t you. I made you do it. I forced you to it.”

Matt went too far. In his zeal, he said the wrong thing.

“You did,” Fisk realized— remembered. “It is... _your_  fault. I’m not like this. It isn’t me. I’m a good man, a good man.” He wrenched away his hand. He disentangled himself from Matt. He got out of the bed. “I am a good man. I do what I have to. I do what I must. Never do I... do I enjoy cruelty for the sake of cruelty.”

Matt sat up. He scoffed. “A good man wouldn’t have to convince himself that he was one.” The conversation was lost. “A good man wouldn’t have an omega he keeps prisoner. That doesn’t just happen to good men, Fisk.”

“You play that card when it suits,” Fisk accused. “You act— You _act_!— weak, and you act dependent. You make known you are an omega. But I will not hurt you because you are beneath me.” Promise returned to the threat. “I will kill you, Matthew, because you are an enemy and an equal.”

“Equal?” Matt demanded. He stood as well, on the other side of the bed with it between them. “Beaten within an inch of death by you and your associates, pregnant with your child. Is that equal? In a fair fight... I’d kill you.” Matt remembered how he once ached for the opportunity. “You can say what you want, Fisk, but you know there’s nothing fair here. When you kill me, I won’t be your enemy, and I sure as hell won’t be your equal. I’ll be an omega, frail and... fresh out of labor. I’ll be defenseless. And then... at my weakest, at your mercy, then you’ll kill me. So hell, Fisk, maybe you are your father.”

Fisk screamed. Impotently and without violence, he screamed. There was no greater insult Matt could have given him than that comparison. Fisk wanted to kill him right then. His hands wanted to rip Matt apart and make him take back what he said. But Matt would not retract the statement, not when it was so true and not when it injured Fisk so greatly. And Fisk could not hurt him, not when Matt was pregnant, not so near its end. Any small thing, even stress, was risky. They both knew it.

Fisk screamed again. He channeled his anger just well enough to destroy the bed instead of Matt. He tossed it, frame and all, onto its side and over. Matt barely stepped away in time.

Boiling with fury and possessing no more levelheaded words to say, Fisk snatched up his jacket and left. He slammed both doors, and when he found one of his men, he gave them Matt’s punishment.

Matt considered himself as good as dead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who thought they were starting to guess how this fic might end, I give you this chapter instead.
> 
> I feel like I’ve been building a block tower this whole time and I just knocked it over. Because I’m an asshole.
> 
> Full chapter title: “Familiarity Breeds Contempt.” Whoops.


	27. Sympathy for the Devil

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shut up. I am damn proud of myself for this chapter title.
> 
> Sorry it’s been over a month since I updated. I finally made myself sit down and type out this chapter. It’s necessary but not my favorite, so I had difficulty drumming up the effort. But the rest of the chapters from here on out are very good, imo.

Fisk learned from his oversight. When he came again, he brought a chair.

He pulled it across the room. It would have been so easy for him to pick up and carry, but instead he dragged the thing, scraping metal legs over concrete flooring and taking longer than necessary to do so.

He unfolded the chair.

He sat down.

“The... doctor is going to induce labor tomorrow.”

He said nothing further.

“Oh.”

It was the only sound Matt could make for a minute or more. Fisk’s sentence was heavy with its many conclusions. A man smaller and weaker than him might not have been able to carry it. Matt gave his verdict the proper consideration.

“I know a part of me should be... happy. Birth of my child, end of my pregnancy, usually happy occasions. But, uh...” He cleared his throat. “You’re still... You’re going to kill me.”

Matt felt nervous and tense. He knew when the moment came, he would do everything in his power to stop it, to fight, to save himself, but the odds felt similar to praying that every gun in a firing squad would jam.

“I’m sorry for what I said the other day,” Matt apologized, lying to do so. “It was... I don’t know where that came from. Hormones or... nerves, probably.”

Fisk did not verbally accept the apology, nor did he offer one of his own. He said nothing.

“I was afraid to, uh, fix the bed,” Matt told him. “I don’t know how much weight is safe to lift, and I... I’ve always been told I push myself too far without realizing. I didn’t want to risk anything bad happening.” His mattress was flat on the floor. After Fisk threw the bed and left, Matt flipped the mattress, but he did not gamble on picking it up to put back on the frame. Now, in front of Fisk in his chair, Matt appeared so much lower than him. He truly felt himself to be at the man’s mercy.

Matt sat beneath Fisk and took several deep breaths within the silence. He did not know what was expected of him, what the man wanted. He filled the quiet with his own words, saying whatever came to mind, and there was so much on his mind.

“I’ve never really been afraid of dying. It’s how I’m able to do the things that I do... did.” The divide between those two words meant so much, for all that there was only three letters’ difference. “If there was something so... momentously wrong with me, why not use it? Why not protect the people who were afraid?” It felt meaningful at the time. “But maybe it was the... manner of death that didn’t bother me. Maybe that... Maybe that’s it. If I died fighting someone, saving someone, it would be a, uh, small price to pay. I was never afraid of death because… living was damn hard already. What was death going to be besides a rest? Finally a... a rest.” Matt pitied himself. “But going out like this, quietly, seems a waste. I’m twenty-eight and there are still so many things I could have done. So many people I could have helped, under a mask or in a courtroom. I could’ve,” his voice cracked but he recovered easily, “I could have been a father, maybe.” Matt tilted his head down, and all of that long hair fell, surrounding his face. “So maybe it isn’t... death I fear, not even now, but I get _why_  people fear it. It’s an end. It’s a stop. It- It’s knowing all the things you’ll never do. It’s realizing your life will only ever amount to what you accomplished before now. It’s all you’ll be remembered for... maybe.

“No family,” Matt went on, speaking simply because Fisk did not stop him. “My social circle’s... on the smaller side. And the longest relationship I ever had was nearly a decade ago, unless you count somehow.” Matt had no idea how to qualify Fisk. What they were was wrong. It was without precedent or explanation. “The only people who will mourn me are my friends, if they’re not already.” Matt thought about them for the first time in a long time. He wondered how they were taking his disappearance after seven months. He would ask how they were doing if he thought for one moment Fisk would tell him. “I don’t know if I should ask you to give them closure or let them keep hoping that maybe I...”

It was daunting, the idea of death, an unheroic, scheduled death. Matt had trouble processing the idea that today was ordinary and tomorrow he would be gone. The thought was too surreal to properly wrap his head around, and yet he tried to think of everything it meant. An end never held so much meaning.

“My dad never wanted me to fight,” Matt confided. “He was a fighter, a boxer. He wasn’t great. His record was... terrible. Lost more than he won, but he- he went out in this... blaze of glory.” Matt smiled. “He was pretty well known in Hell’s Kitchen. Maybe you heard of him, ‘Battlin’ Jack’ Murdock.” Fisk did not answer. “No? Maybe after you left, before you came back.” Matt knew he was rambling, talking for the sake of talking, but also he felt that Fisk was there to let him, to listen. “He was a good punching bag, my dad. The man knew how to take a hit, and another, and another... He’s dead now.” It was fact, undeniable fact, and for that reason alone could Matt say it so passively. “You probably... Maybe you knew that. Maybe you had Wesley look it up.” Matt had no idea how vast Fisk’s research on him was. He assumed all the highlights were in a folder somewhere. “He died shortly after... it happened.” Matt gestured at his eyes. “I say ‘died,’ but the truth is he was murdered. He was... paid to take a dive. The people, the men, who set up his fight bet against him, big. He made his own bet, on himself, to win. And he- he wiped the floor with the guy.” Matt grinned, fond of that pride, momentary as it had been. “But his, uh, financiers didn’t like that... so they shot him. And the- the money he won, it went into a bank account he made in my name. As if... I would rather have the money over him.” Matt never forgot what Stick told him so long ago, that, “Maybe he did it for himself. Maybe he wanted to prove he could, make something of himself, leave the crowd wanting more.” Matt did not and would never know which it was. He would never know why his dad did it. “The worst part... The worst- The worst part is... I think I talked him into it.” Matt laughed because he had to. The alternative was crying. “I knew what he’d done, what he was going to do. I knew he planned to lose. I... heard what I shouldn’t have... when I shouldn’t have. And I told him that... I told him Murdocks, we always get back up on our feet. He did. He really did. He did until he didn’t... in that alley.” The cold dread still haunted him, and the memory of that feeling might never go away. “Kids are stupid,” Matt said. “I was stupid. I didn’t know what making my dad win would do, but somehow... I don’t know. I heard the gunshot and I just knew. I knew what happened, and I knew I was... alone.”

Matt had felt lonely many times since then, but it was broken up by people coming into his life: Stick, Foggy, Elektra, Karen, even Fisk. They were all gone away except for the man who would kill him. Matt was good at being alone, but the last seven months greatly tested his resolve. Even now— especially now— he did not want Fisk to leave.

He kept talking to keep him there.

Matt told stories about Foggy, mischief and drunk nights from college. Fisk smiled at some, or Matt liked to pretend he did. It was nothing more than a feeling and the smile was nothing more than a twitch.

Fisk let Matt talk for hours, anything he wanted to say or get off his chest. He was the would-be priest listening to a dying man’s confession.

They circled, inevitably, back to the present.

“I never thought about children,” Matt said. “I hadn’t yet anyway. I’m still young, so it was one of those things I just... put off. I told myself I’d think about it at ‘this’ age or after I’d met ‘this’ person. Obviously this isn’t the, uh... situation I had in mind.” He took a breath, an intentional one, deeper than the fluttering standard. “I don’t know if I love him. Is that weird, wrong, or is it all right? Logically, we can’t... love someone we’ve never even met. It doesn’t make sense. It defies sense, is what it does... Is what it- is what it does. I mean, how can I love this... stranger, this non-person, who gives me back pain and stretch marks?”

Matt laughed at his problems. They sounded so insignificant when said aloud. They withered in the momentous shadow of what he truly wished to ignore.

“May I hold him?” he asked. His voice was thick. His head was dizzy. There was pressure behind his eyes. He was certain he would cry. “Please, can I just... for a minute? Just one minute.”

Fisk did not answer.

“I can’t do any more harm to your operation. It’s not a weakness to let me. No one has to know. Just please...” Matt cleared his throat. He spoke with more strength but no less desperation. “Please.”

Nothing.

“I just want... to hold my son before you kill me. I need to know that I can love him. Please, Wilson.”

Silence was greater than refusal. It swallowed him like the pitch black night that frightened children. The unknown was more than him. Matt never conquered his fear of the dark. His heightened senses just made him forget about it. He felt it now, that old fear, familiar fear, that inability to see what was in the corners, preying on him.

He was helpless.

In his helplessness, Matt cried. He wiped at his tears, but he did not stem their flow. He let them go until they were all used up, until his eyes were raw and his head hurt. His lips tasted like salt. The skin of his cheeks was tight. He cried over his fate. For nearly ten minutes, he cried in front of an enemy, a confidant. ‘A friend’ Fisk was only by the loosest definition Hell would allow.

Matt did not ask again. Repetition would not inspire pity.

Fisk did not comfort Matt through his breakdown, but he gifted him his handkerchief. He leaned forward and put it in his hand. Matt dabbed at his eyes and wiped his nose. The material was so soft and soothing. It smelled like Fisk.

Matt stopped crying when he was ready and not a minute sooner.

He finally went quiet, in self-pity and in words. There were more things he could have said, more stories to uncage and let fly before the end, but the hour grew late.

He would not sleep.

Fisk waited in the silence. He could tell it was the last one. He stood.

“Thank you for listening.”

“You’re welcome.” They were the second set of words Fisk said since having entered.

“Be good to him, Fisk,” Matt ordered. “Protect him. Be a good father.”

Fisk loosely clutched the back of the chair he had been sitting in. “Of course, Matthew,” he said. His hand tightened with troubled contemplation. It released with decision. He walked around the chair and came to Matt. He learned forward, bending at the waist. Fisk’s hand touched under Matt’s chin, persuading him to turn his face up. He looked, simply looked, at Matt. No. No, not ‘simply.’ There was nothing simple or ordinary about that look. There never had been. Even in their deepest moments of hatred, Fisk looked at Matt with such intensity. And Matt never knew what it was he saw.

His hand traveled with its large, strong, coarse fingers. They spread over Matt’s cheek like spilled liquid. His thumb rubbed just below the eye.

Fisk kissed him. Matt kissed back. It was his last kiss, after all, and it would be a waste to not participate. Most people had no such warning.

When Fisk stood back up, Matt found himself unable to silence such a pitiable and desperate request as the one he did utter. “Would you... stay... and pray with me?”

The question made Fisk uneasy, but Matt never expected it to be a simple one. Fisk did not want to tell him no, not this time. But he did. “I don’t know how to pray,” he said. “I would do more harm than good if I tried, to you and to your religion. I have— I... tried before... I tried to repeat what I’d heard others say. I wanted to talk to your God. I wanted to ask Him for help, for guidance... for validation.” He paused for so long in a stagnant disgust at his own impediment. “But it was only a mimic of the faith which you find so easily. So,” he said, stern but apologetic, “I can’t pray with you. You deserve more, Matthew, than my hollow words. You deserve more than what I could attempt, what emptiness I could... repeat. Understand this,” he asked, “please.”

Matt nodded his head, and it was a shaky movement. Selfishness made him want to reject the answer, but he understood why Fisk had to give it.

He had a Bible transcribed in Braille, one of those many books in his collection. Fisk found it on top of a pile and handed it to him. Matt held onto the thick book, unsure what story or verse could possibly apply to his situation. “Thank you.”

“Try to get some sleep,” Fisk advised, knowing he would not. Perhaps neither of them would. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

Matt half-expected Fisk to put the bed back in order before he left. But that, of course, meant his mind half-doubted it would happen. One side was right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What a heavy chapter. Can I just say that I LOVE Daredevil’s abuse of monologues? There are so many, and I love every one (though I have a few favorites obviously). The actors really get to showcase their skills in those scenes. And these monologues go on for so long, in a way no other show can or will. So, in that spirit, we have a chapter that is almost entirely Matt talking by himself. Sorry if that got boring. It felt meaningful.
> 
> I didn’t want to outright confirm whether or not Fisk fixed the bed back for Matt. Their relationship right now is in such upheaval that you can interpret it however you wish, and I encourage that. So if you want to see Fisk as kinder, then he totally fixed the bed. If you prefer him less compassionate and more clinging to the facade he has of wanting to pretend he still hates Matt, he left the bed as it was. You choose.
> 
> I’ll try not to be another month in updating, but no promises. Haha. No, I won’t. That hiatus was ridiculous. Sorry.


	28. Beginning of the End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I said I wouldn’t, but I still ended up taking a month to update. Sorry. I’m drawing out the suspense! ...Maybe...

No breakfast was brought to him.

Matt knew it was time to eat. The night hours dragged without sleep, but he could guess well enough that it was day.

He was allowed no food because of what awaited.

The door opened. It was Fisk. Matt heard him coming as soon as it could be discerned through the walls upon walls of brick. He heard Fisk stand outside for several minutes before entering.

He held a tray. Matt sniffed.

“I have you—”

“Oatmeal,” Matt interrupted.

“Yes,” he said. “Which you may have after you take this.” He held out his hand. What he had was small and scentless. Matt took it.

“A pill,” he observed, feeling the outline of its packaging. “This ends it?”

“Yes.”

“And if I refuse to swallow?”

“You still go into labor,” Fisk said. “Eventually, you will... on your own, in a day or two perhaps. I’m giving you the opportunity to do it now, while everything is prepared.”

Matt opened his pill, and Fisk handed him a cup of water. He swallowed it down.

“And now we wait?” he asked. “You say everything’s prepared. I won’t fool myself into believing that’s at a hospital. Will it happen in here?” He turned his head, looking sightlessly at the walls which had housed him for seven months.

“A clean room has been prepared elsewhere in the building.”

“Ah,” Matt said. “I heard people working. I just assumed you were bringing me neighbors.”

“I don’t make a habit of holding people captive,” Fisk said.

“Only when you tell yourself it’s necessary.”

Fisk did not further the argument. He handed Matt the tray and bowl of oatmeal.

Matt nibbled at it. “A shot would have been quicker,” he stated. A pill could take hours to dissolve and even more time to get into his system and trigger labor. “Isn’t that the standard method anyway?”

“The doctor,” Fisk said, “doesn’t want to be in the same room as you unless you’re chained.”

“You still think I’m dangerous?” Matt did not feel dangerous. His muscles were as intact as always. There was strength in his arms and legs. He did not have the energy to use it. He did not have stealth. What he had was a momentous disadvantage. He had constant pains that could not be ignored. He had extra weight that offset his balance. He had dizziness when he stood up too soon.

“He does.”

“Do you think I’m dangerous?” Matt repeated. He wanted Fisk’s opinion.

“I believe,” the man conceded, “that you are... capable of... of anything, of everything.” It was almost flattery that Fisk still thought the best of him. It was respectful that nothing, no limitation, could ever make him lesser in Fisk’s eye. But he was wrong.

“Not anymore,” Matt muttered. Pregnancy brought him low, and he would not pretend otherwise. The act for which he would die, by which his life had thus far been spared, was the weakness that would kill him. “Will you still tell yourself I deserved it?” he questioned. He would feel better, at peace, with a truthful answer, whichever way it leaned. “Ki- Killing me, locking me up in the first place, do you still walk away saying it was justified? Is there any room for regret?”

“I don’t want to—”

“Do I deserve this?” Matt cut him off in a stern voice, antagonizing Fisk towards the answer.

“What were my options?” Fisk asked of him, stressing his desperation, his lack of choices. “After I knew it was you in the mask, how could I release you? How could I f... fight you?” Fisk’s hands fiddled restlessly behind his back. He brought them forward, but the fingers still twitched at his sides. “After knowing you were... pregnant, how could I release you? You wouldn’t have stopped, and—”

“You could have,” Matt quietly interrupted. He let his spoon rest against the rim of the bowl with a clink. “Did you never think of that? Did it never occur to you, Wilson, that if you dismantled your empire or used its resources in a lawful way I could have retired? The day we met, you took the blame for what happened, what you did. You admitted you were wrong. Do it now,” Matt urged. “Call it a... a last request, my last request.”

He could not do it. “I was supposed to let you leave that night?” Fisk demanded. “I... _pretend_  I didn’t recognize you? I give up _my_  dream so your own ineffective one could flourish... fall? Fall in our short lifetimes instead of lasting, enduring. You cannot expect such sacrifice.”

“Say it was wrong to imprison me.”

“It was my choice!” Fisk shouted. “It was my only choice. Your alternatives are... unrealistic. I could have changed the world, in my way or in yours, and still changed nothing between us, not after we both knew.” He was upset because Matt was right. Matt was upset because Fisk was right.

“You knew where I lived,” Matt said. “You knew where I worked. You could have...” It was silly. “We could have talked.”

“You’re lying to me again,” Fisk accused. “You’re deceiving me. I could have went to you, bowed before you, obeyed you. I could have done everything you asked and still... and still... you would never have let me know my son.”

Matt shook his head. “No.” Truth and lie were equally cruel, but one of them was owed.

“Then,” Fisk concluded, “I cannot say my choice was the wrong one.”

Fisk was emotionally charged in that moment. He was erratic. His body fumed over the pathetic list of options they had been given. He was upset. His heart beat quickly, and yet Matt knew he was not lying. Fisk had accepted the best option available and he could not say he was wrong. Regret, however, was a separate emotion, one from which not even Matt was exempt.

“I wish things were different.” He did. He truly did.

“Yes,” Fisk agreed without hesitation, “more than anything.”

It was a conclusion of their own making, but it felt unfair, as if some cruel third power tormented them. It was easier to blame someone else— something else— just as Matt wanted to blame Fisk and Fisk wanted to blame Matt. It was more palatable than taking any personal responsibility. Matt knew Fisk was his Wilson weeks before being imprisoned by him. It was in that initial moment of realization that he stopped seeing Wilson as a reasonable man— as a man at all. Matt vilified Fisk because it was easier. Fisk locked him up for the same reason. But that regret, they felt it.

When Fisk thought hardest, his body could not be still. Muscles twitched and rippled the skin up his arms and legs. His fingers flexed. His weight shuffled from one foot to the other and back again, making him sway. Yes, he thought. He thought of every straw he could grasp.

“If I... let you go, you would— you...”

“I would,” Matt confirmed. He was through with lying. It got him nowhere. He might as well go out honest. If Fisk released him, he would go straight to the police about it. That was the truth.

“And if I kept you... here,” Fisk offered as an alternative, “it would be forever. You would hate it.”

“I would,” Matt confirmed. He could last a little longer, a few more months, the full year, but the rest of his life would be unbearable, no matter what gifts or distractions Fisk gave him. “And, of course, the baby wouldn’t stay with me.” It was not a question. It did not need an answer. By now, Matt could surmise his limitations. He would be an omega forever separated from his child.

And that was it. Those were their three options. Fisk chose Matt’s death.

“Will you miss me?” It was an easier question.

“Yes.”

“Think of me every day?” It was not an inquiry but a request. “Don’t... forget me. Don’t... Please don’t tell him Vanessa’s his mother. Tell him about me... Wilson.”

“I will,” Fisk inhaled and exhaled when he spoke, a breathy, tired sound, “dedicate... time each day to you... in my mind.” He evaded Matt’s secondary request.

“Tell him about me,” he repeated. “Tell our baby who I am.”

“You,” Fisk reflected, “are a... man who... who disappeared off the face of the Earth. Telling him about you, he...” If their child had an ounce of the intelligence they each possessed in abundance, he might look into Matt one day— look and assume too much.

“I’m asking you to take that risk,” Matt said, “for me.” It was all he asked.

Fisk gave pause and put so much deliberation into the plea that Matt believed him when he said, “Done. I will... tell him about you, Matthew. I... I promise.” Fisk was too honorable to go back on a vow like that.

“Thank you.”

Matt finished his oatmeal and set the tray aside. Fisk retrieved the button he once gave, Matt’s alerting signal for heat or emergency. He took it from atop the stack of books and put it in his hand. Fisk was leaving while the clock ran down. Matt did not doubt he had business and affairs to put in order before the main event. It was not urgent enough to make him flee without first saying one final word: “I’m sorry.”

“I know.” Matt could not accept the apology. He could not. It was in regards to his preventable death. He was not forgiving of that. “I know.”

Fisk left.

Matt whiled away his anxiety reading through the Bible, letting his fingers trail across each raised word but absorbing none of them. Many times, his hand quit reading only to ball into a fist and strike the mattress in anger. It was not fair. It was not fair.

Time was incalculable. An hour, two, three? Out of a handicap-given necessity, Matt was generally very good at estimating time; however, his current mood dealt substantial damage unto that ability. Time, he rationalized, did not matter. Matt knew he was supposed to cling to every second he had, but mostly, he wanted everything to begin. The interim was torture.

Matt got his wish, and what an anti-climactic start it was, not what he expected, though exactly what he knew it would be. His water broke, and it was a very bizarre, completely incomparable sensation. There was nothing unbearable about it but the ruin of his pants. Matt set his Bible down, knowing he would never pick it up again. He took a very deep breath in. His fingers traced around every curve and corner of the button in his hand. He breathed out.

Before inviting company, Matt moved to the edge of the mattress as best he could. He did not feel exceedingly different from all his past complaints, but the close relationship he had with his body allowed him to sense tremors in his abdomen and hear a small, quickening heartbeat. Matt dropped his pants on the floor of the shower and washed his lower half. He put on a fresh pair and sat back in bed. Above all else, he wanted to stay there, right there, alone.

Matt pushed the button.

Fisk was not long after the signal. He did not go far away and Matt knew that when he left. Fisk stood in the open doorway, and when he spoke, he pretended he was calm, as if Matt could not hear the heart hammering in that great chest. “Well?” He waited in anticipation.

“Well it started,” Matt said.

“Are you...” He had trouble asking.

“So far, so good,” Matt told him. There was no pain or even discomfort, not yet. “No contractions.” He was grateful for that. “Should we wait?”

“No,” Fisk decided. “No, I would rather go ahead and- and move you.”

“Okay,” Matt agreed because he could not disagree.

Fisk left again and came back a minute later with four men. Chains rattled in their hands. It seemed excessive to Matt but necessary to Fisk.

Matt did not present a very graceful image when he stood. One of the men snickered at him and his balance issues. Matt endured the treatment, and he allowed them to cuff his ankles and his wrists. Click, click, click the metal said as it contained him. But before Matt gave up that final hand, he rammed the heel of it up into the nose of the one who laughed. The man howled and fell back. Then everyone laughed at him.

“Enough,” Fisk said, calling an end to their foolishness. “Yes, Mr. Murdock, I believe we now acknowledge how very capable you remain.”

Matt held out his free hand, a limp offering. He went peacefully after retaliation.

Once he was chained, a man left and came back with a wheelchair. Four wheels glided smoothly across the concrete floor and stopped in front of Matt.

“Get in the chair,” Fisk said.

“I can walk.”

“Get in the chair,” Fisk ordered.

Matt sat down. A wheelchair was easier on him than walking. It made it more difficult for him to run or fight.

When Fisk dismissed his men, it was not the order Matt expected. They were alone as Fisk pushed him from his long confining cell and into the hall. Fisk always turned left to exit the building. They now turned right and headed further into its halls. They took an elevator up one floor. They said nothing.

The new room— the delivery room, the room in which Matt would most likely die— was smaller than his cell. It was wide enough to incorporate everything it needed: a chair in the corner, a hospital-grade bed, medical equipment, monitoring electronics, and a counter covered in any tool conceivably necessary. But better than all of that, “There’s a window,” Matt observed.

“Yes.”

“May I... stand there,” he asked, “just for a minute?”

“You can’t see the outside,” Fisk said, as if Matt had forgotten his own disability, “and no one can see you. All it faces is another building, and not even a window.”

“I wasn’t planning on signaling someone,” Matt told him. “I just want to, uh, feel the heat from the sun.” He leaned in the direction of its warmth, though it was across the room. Fisk was silent in contemplation. “Maybe it will help me,” Matt said, “help me get through this.”

“Go,” Fisk permitted.

He held the wheelchair still so Matt could get up. Every step between it and the window rattled as Matt took the widest gait his chains afforded him.

The sun had such special, irreproducible warmth. It was light in its most simple form. It was pure and comforting. Matt turned his head, basking, letting it strike on every curve of his face. Fisk gave him several minutes to soak up the almost forgotten feeling. Then he put a hand on Matt’s shoulder and pulled him back.

“At least it’s a sunny day,” Matt remarked, grateful for that smallest, fated blessing.

He walked to the bed Fisk’s hand steered him towards. It was high off the ground and Matt’s mobility was limited. He could spread his legs no further than a foot. Fisk helped. He practically picked Matt up and sat him down. His hands came away slowly. They hovered down Matt’s body and unlocked the cuffs around his ankles.

“Is this like saying goodbye?” Matt questioned.

Fisk did not immediately answer. When he did, he played ignorant. “What do you mean?” Matt’s left foot came free.

“You could have had someone else do all of this,” Matt pointed out. “You should have, actually. But you’re doing it yourself. Why?”

Fisk opened the second cuff without comment. He grabbed Matt’s right arm and locked it around his wrist, below the other handcuffs. The open end clicked closed around the bed railing. Fisk unlocked the first set of cuffs and walked around the bed. Matt obediently held out his left arm and the dangling cuff clattered at the end of its chain. Fisk secured Matt to that side of the bed as well. He said nothing. He was not going to answer Matt’s question.

Fisk walked to the door and knocked twice: the signal that Matt was secured. The doctor came right in and shut the door. “Uh, good morning,” he said. Neither man greeted him in return. The room was exactly as grim as could be expected. “So... I will just...” The doctor walked to the counter against the wall and washed his hands thoroughly in the sink at the end of it. He put on a pair of gloves that snapped around his wrists. “Water broke yet?”

It was unclear whom he was questioning. Matt answered, “Yes.”

“Contractions?”

“Started a few minutes ago,” Matt admitted, and he surprised Fisk, as if he were responsible for telling him the second something happened. “Nothing serious yet.” He encountered worse through fake labor, but he knew it would equal and surpass it in time.

With very little warning, the doctor lifted Matt’s shirt and prodded all around his stomach. He rested his hand there a moment before pulling away. “And if you’ll just...” He paused. “If you can— If you... Uh, your... pants.” Matt pulled his arm forward, but his hand barely reached his stomach, let alone the waist of his pants. “Right,” the doctor sighed. He did not want to overstep any bounds and touch Matt outside of permission and professional capacity. “Mister...” He cleared his throat. “Sir, if you could... I-If you’d please...”

Fisk stepped forward to assist. As always, Matt was his to touch, his alone. Matt did not object to the possessive treatment. He did not mind it as he once did. After all, was it not true? Was he not Fisk’s? Was Fisk not his? Perhaps not completely, no, but it was a claim he shared with other people. When everything was over, Fisk would still not be rid of him.

His fingers grabbed the elastic waist of Matt’s pants and underwear. He pulled them, and Matt lifted up to help slide the material down and off his legs. He knew he was supposed to feel embarrassed, but both men had seen him naked before. Fisk had seen it more times than could be counted.

Matt drew his knees up, guessing the request before it came. The doctor stuck a finger inside him without warning and Matt jerked in surprise. Fisk’s hand clenched close in a fist he kept at his side. “We’ll be waiting awhile,” the doctor informed. Matt had barely begun. In the meantime, he was prepared in every other way: a heart monitor on his finger and stomach, an IV stuck in the back of his hand, an extra pillow behind his back to make him comfortable, a sheet over his legs to keep him warm and preserve modesty when applicable. “Just the waiting now,” the man said again. He was extremely tense and felt the need to speak when no one else would.

“Leave us.”

Fisk was not argued with. The doctor left them alone.

Matt waited while Fisk paced. He paced and looked anywhere but at the bed. Mostly, he watched the floor, and Matt listened to his shoes tap across linoleum tiles.

“I didn’t sleep,” Fisk whispered in confession. “I... I stood... at the window all night, looking... looking out at my city, thinking of the end my own decree led you to. And I realized,” he decided, “you were wrong. Where you and I are concerned, I am the king from your story. I am he. But it is... just a story, Matthew, a parable. And no one— not your God, not your friends— came to save you.”

There were only lions at the bottom of a pit.

“To be the king,” Matt chanced saying, “means you must have wished they would come. You wanted someone to save me.”

“What I wanted is immaterial,” Fisk lamented. “No one came... because you are not an innocent. You stand guilty of crimes accused.” There was no arguing his claim. Matt was guilty of everything Fisk asserted, everything which offended him.

Matt did not beg again for his life. Fisk was only able to say what he did because it was symbolic and poignant. He compared himself to the king because the king from Matt’s story was powerless. Fisk preferred thinking of himself as thus. He chose to ignore the fact that he alone wielded clemency. Matt could not ask for something Fisk could not give.

“Are you in pain?”

“It’s getting there,” Matt answered. Contractions mounted in severity, but there was so much time between each one, Matt was able to endure them by clenching his teeth and ignoring the chills as every hair on his arm stood up.

Fisk tried to excuse himself from the room. “I’m busy today—”

“You cleared your schedule,” Matt interrupted. He did not want to be lied to, not now.

“What is it you want from me?” He was so tired. They were both tired after a night of no sleep and the arrival of a conclusion neither of them wanted to face. “What?”

“Nothing,” Matt said, which was the selfless answer Fisk did not want. He wanted to hear demands he could deny. That was gloriously simple. It was simplicity during a complex situation— a port in the storm. “Nothing you’ll let me have. Nothing you can give me.”

Fisk was desperately at odds with himself. “I can’t...”

“I know.” They had already discussed and disqualified their alternatives. “I think the worst— God!” Matt tried to double over when a contraction hit unexpectedly. Chains restrained him. “Hmm.” It hurt. He breathed through the pain, and after a moment, it left him. “I think the worst part,” he continued, speaking as if his own body did not interrupt him, “the worst part is you’re just... you’re just a man, aren’t you?” It was difficult for Matt to accept. “You’re not even a bad man.” He was but, “You’re not the one I want you to be.”

They had spent too much time together and neither walked away unaffected. Matt was not the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen; he was Matthew. Fisk was not the Kingpin of Crime; he was Wilson. Matt hated it.

And yet he was comforted to have a man in the room, not a devil.

“Yes,” Fisk said. They did not agree on the right stuff often enough. Everyone suffered.

“Hmm!” Matt clenched the bed sheet, gathering as much fabric as he could into his hands and squeezing. “Damn it,” he cried. He felt muscles contract and harden. His insides went rigid. Matt was too aware of his body. He sensed internal functions that were numb to the average human. He felt too much. He felt too much. It hurt.

Fisk knocked on the door, and the doctor returned. “Check him,” he ordered.

The man saw to Matt. “He’s fine,” he said. “It’s normal.”

“Does that look normal?” Fisk demanded.

He examined Matt again to satisfy Fisk but had to say, if reluctantly, “Yes.” He was the expert, and they could not argue with him, no matter how they felt. Neither Fisk nor Matt had ever been present at a birth. The doctor said he was fine. It was Matt’s overloaded senses that were the problem.

Then it passed, and Matt relaxed as much as he could, knowing it would come back. He exhaled and let his head drop on the pillow. He released the sheet in his hands.

“Better?” the doctor asked.

“Yes,” Matt sighed.

“Time that,” he told Fisk— speaking before he remembered how dangerous the man was, how ill-advised it was to tell him what to do. “P-Please,” he added. Fisk looked at his watch. Matt heard the second hand tick its way around. “How long ago did that last one start?”

“A minute,” Fisk said, “or two... Two,” he decided.

“Add that to the time you get,” the doctor said.

Fisk did not like being told what to do, but Matt speculated the doctor’s request for an assistant had been denied when asked. He was a secret few people were allowed to know about.

“Seven minutes,” Fisk said when Matt tensed and groaned again.

“Can I get, uh,” Matt gritted his teeth against the contraction, “something for the pain? Please.” It was a different strain than what he was used to, what he had trained against. It was harder than the cramps he usually experienced. He could suffer it, but he preferred not to.

The doctor said nothing. He moved slightly. He looked to Fisk for permission.

“Go on,” Fisk commanded after a moment. “Give the man something for his pain. We’re not animals.”

“I-I’m not an anesthesiologist,” he stammered.

“Then give him what you can.”

The doctor thought for a second. He left.

“If you need anything else,” Fisk said to Matt, “tell the doctor and he will accommodate you.”

“If you’re in a mood to grant- to grant- to grant— ah!— requests,” Matt said, “I’d like a hospital.”

Fisk did not refuse him because the answer was already so very obvious. Instead, he offered a brief word of encouragement. “Many... many people did this for thousands of years before hospitals. You have more than them. You are... stronger than them, Matthew.”

“You should’ve just killed me,” Matt whined, “that night in the warehouse.”

“You are being overly theatrical,” Fisk chastised.

“I’m in labor with your... with your kid,” Matt said. “I get to be as dramatic as I— God!” He tried to take measured breaths. “Why didn’t you kill me that night?” It was a genuine question groping for its answer.

“You were... supposedly blind,” Fisk said, “and I was curious.”

“Why didn’t you kill me?” Matt asked again, dissatisfied with Fisk’s response.

Matt was a safe audience for secrets. Whom could he tell? “You consumed me,” Fisk confessed in a quiet, shameful voice. “For some time you... you did. After we met, I... had you researched. I hired your firm to help you financially. I wanted to h... I wanted to help. I thought of... approaching you again, of asking for a chance to make amends for what I did. There was... so much I would have done for a second chance. It was my first impulse, my first... resolution to kill the Man in the Mask, or let Nobu do it for me. For you, I had no plan. For Matthew Murdock, the blind attorney from the street, I did not know what to do.” That was his honest answer. “But you were pregnant,” he said, “and the decision was made for me.” He sounded frustrated by it, angry at himself and at his weakness that he needed a cheat like that to make his choice.

“You found your answer once the shock wore off,” Matt assumed.

“Yes.” Matt had to die. There was no other way.

That contraction ebbed in less than a minute, but it was a very long minute.

“You did this,” Matt accused when the next one started.

“Yes,” Fisk agreed, “and for it, I long ago took the blame. And now you, Matthew, will end it.”

“Why,” Matt scoffed, “so you can kill me sooner?”

“No,” he said, “for the sake of your child, our child.”

“‘Our child,’” Matt repeated in a murmur. His overall plan of manipulation had fizzled out to nearly nothing, but somehow he did not regret telling Fisk the baby was his. The man was excited. One of them needed to be.

The doctor finally returned. He had a plastic syringe and a glass vial.

“He has a high tolerance for drugs,” Fisk informed. “Give him however much you can.”

“Thank you,” Matt said. It was basic human decency, but he was appreciative to see it now of all times.

Whatever the doctor injected into his IV, it started working before the next contraction. Matt noticed a stark difference. There was still pain, but he was less aware of it, as if the connection to his brain were muddied. To Matt, it was bliss. His sight was weakened drastically, but that was a handicap he accepted. Touch was hit hardest. Its signals were most disrupted. But Matt could still hear well, even if his brain was sluggish in response. He was not in debilitating pain, however, and he welcomed the Pyrrhic victory. He was able to think on something other than the dwindling reprieve until his internal muscles contracted and cramped again.

“Water?” he asked. His tongue stuck to the inside of his mouth. He was thirsty. “Can I have some water, please?”

The doctor nodded. Fisk filled a cup from a pitcher. The water was cool and its container sweated with condensation. Matt reached out. He was so distracted in mind and crippled in his senses, he could barely focus, but he knew he was missing his mark. Fisk put the cup in his hand.

“Slowly,” he advised. “You sip it... You sip it slowly.”

Matt picked up his head. He tried to bring the cup to his mouth, but the chain snapped taut. Matt spilled most of the water on himself. “Damn it,” he whined. It was unfair.

“Hush,” Fisk said, knowing Matt was primed to complain about his predicament. He poured more water into the cup. Matt reached for it again, but Fisk moved past his hand. “Head up.” Matt leaned forward. He drank from the cup Fisk held. He drank slowly. Fisk’s hand was steady.

“Thank you,” Matt said when he pulled away. His thirst was not fully met, but it abated.

Fisk set down the cup. He tossed a towel onto Matt’s chest so he could dry what water was within the radius of his chain.

“I have to...” Fisk headed for the door. “I have business to see to. Keep me updated,” he told the doctor.

Matt did not want him to go, but he would not ask him to stay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Seems like a weird place to stop, doesn’t it? Haha. But to me, this chapter is like walking up the hill, and the next one is like going down it. The purpose of each is different. So have some more waiting.
> 
> Two more chapters! Ah!


	29. Exit Music

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Scream]

Matt did not know how long it took. Time distorted like a hallucination. He heard watches ticking but did not have a head to count seconds. It all ran together.

The whole ordeal lasted hours; he knew that much. Fisk left the room often. His presence was a ground. His absence was noticed. The blank corner was an empty space that rang with high frequency.

Fisk could pretend, but Matt knew he did not go far. There was a room on an intersecting hallway. Fisk sat there with Wesley. Matt could never focus long enough to know what they spoke about. Modesty forced him to concede that very little of it was actually about him.

Then Fisk would leave Wesley and business to check on Matt. He went back and forth, spending far too little time where he was most wanted.

When the end came and the difficulties were at their worst, Matt could not— he could not— prevent himself from begging Fisk to stop leaving.

It was Matt’s lone favor that he was at his absolute worst. He was tired, and desperate, and wore a layer of sweat on his skin. His too long hair became more frustrating yet and hung in his eyes. It stuck wetly to his face.

The plea Matt said to Fisk carried no intentional manipulation. It was filled with mindless utterances he could never knowledgeably repeat, their being gone from memory as soon as they left his mouth. Innocently, pitifully, they appealed for something so simple as the man’s steady presence. The only thing that could have topped it all and made Matt more pathetic is if he were crying, and that was not such a far off concept. He just might if Fisk refused him and left again.

“Please, Wilson.”

He stayed.

Fisk did not hold Matt’s hand nor give anything outside of the occasional word of progress or encouragement, but it was something. Matt liked not being alone for it. He wished it were anyone else, anyone better— Foggy, if he had a choice— but having someone other than the too silent, too clinical doctor was a blessing. Matt was grateful for Fisk, surprisingly grateful.

Then it was over. The finish came in a rush. After hours of buildup, it ended quickly, suddenly. Matt dropped hard on the bed. It was over. He was exhausted and sore and soaked with a ceaseless sweat, but it was over.

The most important part, however, had only just begun.

Above loud lights, beating hearts, and his own heaving breath, Matt heard it: a cry. It was a weak sound but loud— and very unhappy. The baby was screaming. It screamed until it ran out of breath, then it screamed again.

“How is it?” Fisk asked. “He— how is he?” So it was a boy after all.

The doctor did not reply immediately. Matt assumed the proper assessments needed to be completed before he gave an answer. There was a suctioning noise that was unfavorable to its recipient. The doctor went over his little arms and legs and muttered further remarks to himself about heart rate and breathing. “Fine,” he eventually said. “He seems very healthy, but I have to... I have to check him again... in a few minutes.” He moved away. “Let me wash him, please, then you can hold him.”

Fisk was impatient. He loomed over the man and the sink of rushing water. Further assessments were made after the cursory bath. At one point, the doctor said a number of, “nine pounds, ten ounces,” and it was a weight Matt had no trouble believing. A small, crinkling diaper was put on him.

There was a folded blanket on the counter. Fisk grabbed it and threw it open with a shake. He made a supportive cradle in his arms, and the doctor placed the baby in it. The blanket wrapped back up with their son inside. Fisk held him and was at last content. He smiled. It was a warm smile with no motive but pride and happiness. Because Matt confessed the truth, because he told Fisk the child was his, the man could look at their son without concerns of a DNA test and what he would do if it came back negative. Fisk was a happy father.

“You can feed him,” the doctor suggested, and he handed Fisk a bottle for the newborn.

“Leave,” Fisk ordered the man. The boundless bliss he displayed was disarming of intimidation and could not be witnessed by subordinates.

“I- I might,” the man stammered, “be needed, perhaps?” He rightfully worried that his role was over. He had become dispensable. “Do you want me to... I could check on him.” He gestured to Matt’s prone form on the bed.

“You’re dismissed,” Fisk stated, “for the moment.”

A possible need in the future alleviated the doctor’s concerns, though Matt knew it was foolish to feel safe. He left without another word. The door opened and closed, and the number of people in the room decreased by one.

They were alone. The three of them were alone.

It was quiet.

Their son was hushed, soothed, pacified by the bottle he suckled. Matt wanted Fisk to make him cry again, so he could hear the baby and find him better, but that sounded so selfish and cruel.

Fisk held the child. He was still and comforting and rocked the bundle in his large arms with the perfect movements, gradual and consoling. Matt was not surprised by his competence. It was the gentle side of the man. There was no doubt in his ability. The other side, the darker side, was what Matt worried over.

“He is so... well behaved,” Fisk spoke.

“Fisk,” Matt begged, “Wilson, please—”

“Quiet,” the man snapped, cutting him off, knowing what he wanted. “This is my time with my son, and you will respect that, Matthew.”

Matt obeyed, being capable of little else. Arguing with Fisk would only anger him, and if that scale tipped, Matt lost any chance.

He waited for so long, half-an-hour maybe, longer from his eager impatience.

He waited with a heart that hurt, that suffered inexplicable loss and injury, a dragging pain of distance. He yearned to experience that something new. He needed to feel it. He needed it.

He waited.

Fisk came to the bed and Matt hoped, silently he hoped. Fisk reached into his pocket and took out something small and metal. “Your other arm,” he said, calling for the one across the bed. Matt pulled it over as far as the chain would allow. Fisk unlocked the cuff. “You get one hand,” he said when Matt held up the other. It was enough.

Very gently, very slowly, Fisk handed the baby to him. Matt turned over on his side, coming closer to his chained hand so that he might use both. He took the small weight nestled in its soft blanket. It was heavy and light at the same time. Fisk let go and stood up straight. He did not leave. He hovered.

“I am not a cruel man,” he insisted, proved. There was no denying that it was his original intent, however, spoken long ago in anger. Time and endearment had banished the planned torture.

“Thank you, Wilson,” Matt genuinely expressed. His voice sounded thick and emotional in his ears. He blamed a changing whirlwind of hormones.

“Can you see him?” Fisk asked. He did not fully understand Matt’s ability, and to be fair, true potency was dependent upon so many variables. “Can you see his face?” Fisk wanted it for him. Matt could hear the reserved, fettered optimism. Fisk wanted him to be able to see the baby, their baby. It was a mercy for a dying man, needing to be fulfilled.

Matt focused and he chuckled, feeling oddly happy, surprisingly peaceful. “Yeah,” he said. “His cheeks are warm. I see them. They’re round and,” he grinned, “fat. His lips are wet. They poke out from his face, and they are... open, just a little.” Through those features, Matt guessed the proportions of his face. He touched the baby gently with two fingers. “Soft skin,” he said, “very soft. It feels good to touch.” He traced up the outward curve of wide cheeks. “Hair,” Matt said, “just a little in the middle— uh, dark, if I had to guess.” He could not make many assessments past that.

“He has big eyes,” Fisk described, knowing the end of the discernible had been met. He tried to help with what Matt could not see. “He’s... looking at you, but I don’t think he sees very well.”

“That makes two of us,” Matt joked. “He’ll get better.”

“His eyes are very big and... dark,” Fisk went on, “like a dog’s.”

“‘Dark like a dog’s,’” Matt repeated. He smiled, finding humor in the comparison. It helped though. It helped him imagine. He saw big brown eyes in which he could barely make out the pupil.

“His skin is pale,” Fisk said, “but his cheeks are... red at the moment, strained.”

“He’s just been through a lot,” Matt excused.

“He did very well,” Fisk lauded, “a fighter.”

“No.” Matt shook his head. “Not a fighter.” He understood now. He understood that protectiveness his own father had insisted upon, that want for a better life. “Just a... happy child.”

He stroked the head beneath his fingertips. He felt soft hair sticking out from softer skin. There was a vague image in his mind, constructed from secondhand details like a police sketch. Matt could picture his son. He saw him.

“He’s beautiful.” It was, as he imagined, what all parents said of their children. There was nothing special about his opinion other than the fact that it was him and his child. But to Matt, his was the most beautiful baby in the world. “Thank you, Wilson.” He sniffed, trying not to cry. He had shed enough tears the previous night, though the motivations behind them were so opposite.

Fisk did not respond to his gratitude. “Do you love him?”

“I’m sorry?”

“You were... afraid,” he reminded, “afraid because you did not love him. But you’ve met now. So... what do you think?”

“Yes,” Matt said. One day and one introduction made so much difference. Where before he had been unsure and apprehensive, now nothing had ever been more obvious. What a silly and instantaneous thing parental love was. “Yes, I love him.”

“Good.” Fisk stood up straight. He looked at him, at the two of them. His mind was a mystery but almost audible with how loudly it churned.

Matt knew he was planning the most merciful of deaths, an injection in the IV line perhaps. Or maybe that was too dependent upon Matt’s will to live. He had an arm free, and he was not giving the use of it up again. Fisk would probably strangle him while their son laid in the bed between them. Those hands Matt oftentimes enjoyed the strength of were going to choke him. Then again, seven months together had made Fisk a coward to his own decree. As he said, he could not prevent the fate he ordered for Matt. He could run away from it though. He could take the baby and run, have some goon come in and put a few bullets in Matt.

“Do it yourself,” Matt ordered. He was in no position to make demands, but he would have it no other way. “Don’t outsource me, you son of a bitch. Don’t you dare.”

The dark, dangerous shadow of Wilson Fisk loomed above him and lowered. Matt kissed his son’s head.

Fisk grabbed him roughly by the arm and unlocked the cuff on Matt’s second hand. The metal fell open on the bed.

“What are you doing?” Matt questioned, confused but hopeful.

“We are the same, Matthew,” he answered. “I saw him... and I loved him. I love him more than myself. I love him more than the- than the city. I love him. And now I act in his best interest.” Fisk traced a finger over their son’s round cheek. He took a step back to emphasize Matt’s freedom. “Take him and go. I cannot make myself stand idle long.” He was outside sense and reason. He knew that. Any more thought on the matter would surely change his mind. Matt would not argue with nor question his only chance.

“Hold him,” he asked, giving Fisk that final opportunity to know the little boy they now loved. “Can you hold him while I get dressed?”

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, of course.”

Their son disappeared in his great arms. Fisk’s body heat blocked the tiny form. Matt still heard the heartbeat, so faint, so fragile.

“Are you all right to walk?” Fisk asked as he watched Matt dressed with difficulty.

“I’ve had worse,” he chuckled. They knew that to be absolutely true. Matt pulled his pants up past his knees. Fisk offered a hand and tugged him all the way to his feet. Matt stood slowly and brought his pants up the rest of the way. “This is supposed to be good, right? Walking afterwards, it’s good.”

“I wouldn’t know. I don’t know,” Fisk admitted. They were both so inexperienced with parenthood and its aftershocks.

“Let’s find out.” Matt would walk from his horrors and his imprisonment until his legs gave out. He took a step towards Fisk and parting his legs was fire and agony. “God!” he shouted. He took a deep breath and a smaller step. “I’m good,” he said. Fisk did not entirely believe that, but he slowly gave up the baby when Matt held out his arms. They were so close. The two of them were so close with their son in the middle. Matt knew Fisk did not want to give up the boy any more than he did.

“You should go,” Fisk whispered. He did not step back as he had before at Matt’s bedside. He had a harder time letting them leave.

“Yeah.” As uncertain as Matt’s future was that morning, now it was even worse. What did freedom even feel like anymore? He could not recall.

“Go,” Fisk said again, louder.

Matt did not need to be told a third time.

His senses were still dull from medication, like being less able to taste food when sick. He found the door because he knew where it was. He had memorized the space it occupied. He felt the rush of wind every time it opened. Matt twisted the metal doorknob and stepped into the hall. It was quiet— or rather, he heard nothing. Matt thought deeply and recalled the path to the elevator. He went. His steps were not an adequate walk, but a shuffle. His bare feet dragged on the floor and were barely picked up as he moved.

Matt did not clear the first corner before a voice stopped him, a voice that was louder than its owner’s steps, louder than his heart.

“I was afraid something like this would happen.”

Wesley cocked the gun as a mindful courtesy, letting Matt know it was there and aimed at him.

Matt froze, unsure of what to do. Even if he were in a condition to fight, Wesley was a dozen feet away and armed. He would shoot before Matt ever laid a hand on him.

Fisk exited the room and came up behind Matt. He walked around him and down the hall. “Let him go, Wesley.”

“With all due respect, sir,” Wesley said, “I let him leave, he sends you to prison. He has you on kidnapping at least. But seeing that he is a... rather cunning lawyer, I’m sure he’ll pull a few more charges out of his hat, those he can prove anyway.”

“Let him go,” Fisk said again.

“He’s nothing,” Wesley argued. “I can’t let you tear down what you’ve built, not for him. You’ll regret it the instant he leaves.”

“I’m not doing it for him.” Fisk took a step forward. “Now, lower your gun.”

The instinct to obey quarreled against love and devotion. “I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t. I will accept any enmity afterward.”

“Very well,” Fisk relented. Matt’s breath quickened. He held his son tighter. “But I’ll do it. Like a dog, he is mine, my responsibility.”

Wesley chuckled, one quick exhale to go with the smile he wore. The gun changed hands.

Fisk walked back towards Matt with his heavy footfalls.

Step.

Step.

Step.

“Give me the boy,” he ordered.

“No.”

“I’m going to shoot you,” Fisk said. “And you are going to... fall.” How he agonized over it, that horrid thing he could not change and did retract the pardon of when confronted by logic. “Do you want to be holding him when that happens?”

Of course not. Nor did Matt want to fight and risk one of them dropping the baby. Fisk knew that. He abused the knowledge. Matt had to do what was right for their son, even if it was the voluntary surrender of his life.

Fisk held the gun in his left hand and kept it on Matt the entire time the infant changed hands. Matt placed him gently in the cradle of Fisk’s arm. The hard soles of Fisk’s shoes clapped under heavy weight as he walked backwards to stand at Wesley’s side. In one hand was the gun. The other held their son. It was a twisted, disgusting contrast of violence and love. Matt was a victim to them both.

He stood in the hall and prepared for death, more real now than in the entire seven months prior. This was it. He closed his eyes and bowed his head but could not think of an adequate prayer. What could he ask for but escape from death? It would not come. Their was no safety in that long hallway. The only place to go was the room behind him, and Matt was not fast enough to outrun a bullet in getting there. A prayer for swift deliverance to Heaven, a plea that all the wrath he waged did not disqualify him, the best life for his son, that was what Matt asked.

He nodded his head and lifted it high. It was his end. He was not a coward. When he lost, he would lose on his feet. He would keep his arms at his sides in peace. He would make his murderer look him in his vacant eyes.

Fisk hesitated. The gun shook in his hand, small tremors only Matt could detect. “I’m sorry this had to happen,” he said.

“I know,” Matt replied.

A sound, faint.

Blood in the air, minimal.

Pain, recoverable.

He went down. Wesley went down. He fell into a heap on the dirty floor. The gun twisted back around in Fisk’s hand. He moved his fingers from the barrel and back onto the grip he clubbed Wesley in the head with. Matt was shocked, understandably dumbfounded. He was a witness and yet still could not believe. For a second time, Fisk chose to let Matt live.

Fisk put the toe of his shoe against Wesley’s shoulder and rolled him onto his back. “He’ll be all right,” Fisk said for himself and his own assurances. In that moment, Matt did not care for the fate of a man who tried to kill him. “He’ll be a- a little angry perhaps, disappointed, but physically fine.”

Matt took one cautious step. Fisk did not pick the gun up and point. “Where does that leave us?” He waited for the man to change his mind, again and again, until he was dead from a split second decision.

“Where we were,” Fisk honorably answered. “Go, Matthew. Take him... and leave.” Matt brought his other foot forward. “Leave Wesley out of it,” Fisk demanded. “You come after me and me alone.”

“He’s your right hand man,” Matt reasoned. “Does everything you say. If I don’t take him down as an accomplice, you’ll run your business from prison, through him.”

“Most likely, yes,” Fisk agreed. He did not lie. “But you don’t leave here until you give me your word.” He did not lie.

“Done.”

Wesley was a fight for another day. Matt had another, more important priority. He would always have a higher priority now. He was a father.

Fisk stepped aside, moving his impeding presence to the wall, allowing passage. Matt took every discoordinated, limping step with the expectation of being stopped, as if Fisk would suddenly come to his senses. When he drew even with the man, he stood still.

“Thank you.” Fisk claimed he spared Matt’s life for their son’s sake only. Matt preferred to read between the lines. “Thank you, Fisk.”

He waited. Fisk did not want to give the baby up, no matter how necessary he considered it. Matt let them have a moment.

Fisk rubbed his hand over their son’s head, fondly and finally. He touched a delicate cheek with his thumb. There was a whining grunt, then a persistent whimper, dragging out in one high tone that grew louder. The baby began to cry, and why was no mystery, not after everything going on around him.

“Shh,” Fisk whispered. “Shh, shh.” His comforting tone and gentle swaying did not quell the beginning cries.

“C-Can I?” Matt asked. Hesitantly, he held out his arms.

To say he was poorly prepared was a substantial understatement. He knew nothing about babies outside of secondhand mentions. For all Matt knew, Fisk was the better choice. He was a natural with his quiet, nonthreatening persona that would do anything for those he cared about. Matt spent seven months thinking he would die, and even in his many escape plans, the baby was never there with him. Fisk said over and over that he would not know their son. Matt had believed him, and he never spared a moment to the idea of fatherhood.

“His head— Watch his... Make sure you hold his head,” Fisk chided when he gave Matt the crying child.

“I’ve got him.” The weight fit well in Matt’s arms. He liked it. Fisk stayed near and watched engrossed as Matt tried to soothe the baby. “Shh,” he cooed. His best guess and greatest attempt was no better than Fisk’s. “You’re okay,” he spoke in a soft voice. “You’re gonna be okay. Nothing will... No one... will hurt you.” Matt would make sure of it. He kept talking and moving his arms in a sway. It felt like more dumb luck than skill when the crying calmed down.

“He knows your voice,” Fisk said. After the conclusion of nine months in darkness, Matt’s voice was the most familiar thing he knew. “It’s reassuring... for him.” Hearing was Matt’s favorite sense. That it helped his son find peace was comforting and relatable.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” Matt admitted, and somehow he could not help but laugh about it. “I don’t know what I’m doing. The books you gave me, they all... they stopped here.”

“You’ll figure it out,” Fisk assured him. “You’re a very smart man.”

They were so close, and Fisk did not step back a third time. He stood where he was, an interloper in Matt’s personal space— personal space being a concept which had not existed between them in some time. His hand acted when Matt’s were full and occupied. Fisk put his palm up against Matt’s cheek, holding his face in his hand. Matt thought— he knew— Fisk wanted to kiss him one last time. It would be foolish, however. It would be reckless. They knew better. Their relationship, if it could ever truly be called that, was best left where they ended it the night before. That chapter of their lives was over forever. They knew that, and they refused to complicate its end. It would stay locked down in that cell.

They were through.

“You should...” Fisk cleared his throat. He took away his hand. “You should go.”

“Yeah.”

“Be a good father,” he said, the same demand Matt forced on him the night before.

“Of course.” Matt would fail— in some areas. He knew that. He knew no parent was perfect. He knew he was a poor candidate for the job. But he would do his best. “I promise.”

“Goodbye, Matthew.” He leaned down and gave a kiss to their son’s head. More softly, he murmured, “Goodbye, Daniel.”

Matt smiled but it was weighted and sad. He did not care to hide his emotion from Fisk, his knowledge that it was a bittersweet farewell. One of them had to win and the other had to lose. That was always the rule, and even now it was not changed. Fisk surrendered. For his son, he surrendered.

“Goodbye, Wilson.”

Matt left. Fisk watched him— them— leave. Matt listened to the man’s heart grow more and more faint in his ears. He left. He followed hallways and avoided Fisk’s security. He left.

The street outside was soaked in a setting sun. Matt stopped the first person on a cellphone and asked them to call 911— a hospital, not a cop with dubious morals.

He was free.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOO! Done.
> 
> Epilogue to come! Should be up tomorrow, maybe. I’ve finished writing it. I just have to proofread.
> 
> So there’s the big ending. Fisk couldn’t let Matt go for either of their sakes, but he had to do it for their son. Is it a cheesy cop-out? Yeah, maybe. But he really didn’t want to kill Matt anymore, and this was the last contributory reason he needed to do the right thing. Fisk put his family over himself and his dreams for the city.
> 
> Symbolism/foreshadowing revisited from the last chapter and chapter 16. Which is sort of drawn to attention here by Fisk calling the baby “Daniel.” In the final confrontation, Fisk is God and Wesley represents the lions who were withheld by God. Just because. Symbolism and foreshadowing are fun.
> 
> I guess because Fisk is so big, but I like them having a big fat chubby little baby. Poor Matt. Haha. I mean, I could’ve gone bigger. You just know Fisk was a big baby. But I stopped before hitting ten pounds to prevent the dreaded c-section. That would’ve complicated the great escape.
> 
> Matt living was always the ending, but I would be lying to say that, along the way, I didn’t think of an AU where Fisk does kill him. And that would be killing Matt after all this interaction they’ve had. And after the fact, Fisk regrets it immediately, but he can’t take it back, of course. Matt is irrevocably dead. (Imagine, if you will, Fisk choking Matt followed by the immediate desperation and futility of giving him CPR. Calling the doctor back in. Something like that.) Then the presence of this child Fisk so greatly wanted becomes tainted. Because he can’t look at their son without thinking of Matt, a man who never really did anything wrong, who only wanted what was best for the city. Killing Matt is not an evil Fisk can ever forget. He is reminded of Matt constantly through their son. He is haunted, as Matt claimed he would be. So, not wanting to see the child and BE reminded, Fisk pushes their son (named Daniel, like Matt wanted) away through nannies and later boarding schools, and everything suffers and all was for naught. The end.


	30. House of the Crosses

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you made a playlist of the songs used as chapter titles, it would sound weird and mismatched and don’t do it.
> 
> I know at least some of you probably want the Foggy/Karen reaction, but it just seems like such an obvious thing that it’d be no fun to write. Or read. We know how they would react. Karen would cry. Foggy would threaten to kill Fisk. While crying. Cute sentimentality over baby, etc. I would just be putting specific words over a conversation we can all guess at. Seems unnecessary. Sorry. 
> 
> As always, I’d rather jump in and focus right... here...

“Here to gloat?” Fisk said, making those the first words spoken between them in months.

“No,” Matt answered. “No, I’m not here to gloat.”

“Then you are here to flaunt yourself as the better man,” Fisk presumed, “which, as I’m certain you can see, is the same as gloating.”

“I came to talk,” Matt said, though the idea sounded better planned in his head than when implemented.

“What makes you think,” Fisk spat, “I would want to listen?”

“You knew what would happen,” he said. “The minute you let me go, you knew. You can’t fault me for actually taking you down within the system, not when you gave me the artillery to do it.”

A loud buzzer droned as a door opened several halls away. A prisoner walked through under instruction from the guard. It was the nearest activity around them. By coincidence or design, Matt and Fisk were alone in the visitation room. Nine surrounding booths were vacant. They sat in the lone occupancy with a plate of glass between them. Through it, Matt could still sense Fisk. It was a more blurry representation than speaking with someone unimpeded, but Matt could find the outline of the man and see every facial tic. Through the receiver held to his ear, Matt heard him inhale.

“I found the... rape charge to be somewhat overreaching,” Fisk remarked.

“As your lawyer tried to argue,” Matt recounted. “But sexual acts elevated the kidnapping charge to the first degree. I wanted to hit you with every offense I could think of to ensure the longest sentence possible.” And yet Fisk still received the minimum imprisonment on all counts with the option of parole. His lawyer— his team of lawyers— were really very good. “For what it’s worth,” Matt expressed, “I am sorry about Vanessa.” If she knew about Fisk’s criminal enterprise, she had forgiven or excused it. There was no justification for Matt. There was no greater good, no rationale, behind keeping a pregnant blind man locked up underground for months. Matt did not know that she left Fisk, but she was never present for a court hearing, not once. Absence, lack of support, it was easy to read between their lines.

Pettiness and vengeance made Matt want to feel satisfied. It was what Fisk deserved, his punishment upon punishment. After all, the man was not blameless in all that transpired. He was not unjustly prosecuted for it. He could have let Matt go at any time. He could have never locked him up to begin with. But Fisk cared for Vanessa, and losing her did not benefit Matt’s cause. It did not contribute more jail time. It did not collapse Fisk’s empire. It hurt a man. That was it. That was all.

“I know you loved her.”

Maybe Matt and the atrocities inflicted upon him were Vanessa’s final straw, or maybe the couple broke up before then, before court, before the arrest. Matt would never know. As before, as within that one time he was bold enough to mention her name, Fisk did not want to talk about Vanessa. He said nothing on the subject now, not one word to warn against her mention. Silently, Fisk endured Matt’s sympathy. And when he did speak, it was not about her.

“Why are you here?”

Matt tucked the phone receiver between his neck and shoulder. He reached into the inner pocket of his jacket. One side of the photograph was loud, a bright, blank white. He pressed the opposite side against the scratched glass between them. “I have it on good authority that this is a nice picture of him. I thought maybe one of us, at least, should be able to look at it.”

Fisk said nothing, and Matt felt silly holding his arm up. After a moment, he pulled back, lifting the picture from the glass.

“Wait.”

Matt put it back. He kept it there, recognizing Fisk’s silence not as derision, but as a loving awe. Matt lowered his elbow to the table, propping his arm up, displaying the photo like a human easel.

“I’ll leave this for you,” he offered. “It’s yours.”

“Thank you,” Fisk said, genuinely grateful and momentarily forgetting their compulsory animosity.

“It’s the least I could do.” Matt was not apologizing for sending Fisk to prison. The man very much deserved that. If anything, Matt regretted being unable to charge him with everything he was truly guilty of. Instead, the picture was his thanks. “You knew I’d ruin you,” he said. “You knew. And you let me go anyway.”

“There was never a... world where we raised the child together. I made a choice, gambling on the- on the better option.”

“You’re a good father, Wilson,” Matt said, telling Fisk what he needed to hear, deserved to hear, saying it with their son held up for him to see. “You let it all fall down for him.”

“My father...” Fisk’s heavy fingers tapped on the steel table. His pulse quickened in the face of unpleasant reflection. “My father was a- a cruel man, a horrible... man. Everything I do is in opposition to his memory. Therefore, Matthew, I am... made to be a good father myself.”

Matt believed him.

“I can’t bring him here.”

“I wouldn’t want you to.”

On that, they were in agreement.

“You did a good job keeping it all out of the media,” Matt commented.

“As did you,” Fisk replied. “Something so... contemptible would have come out even with my influence.”

“He doesn’t need to grow up with that,” Matt said, “the stigma, the pity, the people... looking at him and knowing.”

“No,” Fisk agreed. “No, he doesn’t.”

It was one more thing they had in common. They wanted what was best for their son. If only it were enough to overpower all else upon which they disagreed.

“Stop having Wesley send checks,” Matt instructed.

“The money isn’t for you.”

“No, but I know where it comes from,” he said, “so I won’t be cashing them, not now, not ever.”

“And yet you accepted the furniture,” Fisk derided, “and the other gifts.”

Matt sighed. “Because I didn’t have anything.” He went to the prison knowing the accepted delivery of baby furniture, clothes, and supplies would be thrown at him. “I wouldn’t even have a place to live if my friend hadn’t moved himself into my apartment and paid the rent. He never gave up.” Matt would always be so grateful for Foggy and his hope.

“Your friend is a good man.”

“Too good,” Matt agreed. “He didn’t want me taking your... gifts. The only reason he let me was because I said I’d pay you back... every cent.”

“I don’t want your money.”

“I don’t care what you want,” Matt said. “And I’m not accepting anything else you send,” he swore. “So stop.”

Fisk did not like it, the idea that Matt was putting pride and integrity above their child, that Matt was digging himself into possible debt. But Fisk made his decision. He had put his trust in Matt and whatever method of childrearing he chose. He was still angered, just not enough to do or say anything about it.

“Honest to a fault,” Fisk mused. His fingers tapped on the tabletop, fidgeting. “I’ve set up...” He stopped and began again, correcting himself. “I’ve had Wesley set up a- a very... sizable trust in the boy’s name. When he turns eighteen, it will be his choice if he wants to take it or- or not.”

“If I raise him right,” Matt said, “he won’t.”

The thought of Matt raising their son, alone, made Fisk finally ask, “How is he?” He delayed that aching inquiry as long as he could, but eventually, he did ask. He wanted more evidence than a photograph. “Is he all right? Is he- Is he happy?” Fisk was a good father, and Matt would never convince himself otherwise. There was too much evidence to support it.

“Yeah,” Matt told him. “He... The doctor says he’s maturing on schedule. He’s normal. He’s, uh... He’s perfect.”

“‘Perfect,’” Fisk murmured, and he was calmed and contented by such news. He treasured the word and its every meaning. “And what is he like?” It was optimistic to ask for personality out of a four-month-old.

“He’s smiling now,” Matt said, “all the time, not just on accident.”

“And you can see that?” Fisk understood that Matt was at a disadvantage to most other parents. He, and he alone, knew Matt had other, superior attributes. However, he never could decipher how they worked or how many blanks were filled in by those senses.

Matt nodded. “More or less.” He saw it the same as anyone else. He saw it differently. “He’s not blind,” Matt let him know, laying to bed any possible concern. “In case you were worried about that, he’s not.”

“No,” Fisk said. “No, of course not. Your... affliction was the result of an accident, not genetics.” He forgot no detail of Matt’s life. “But even if so, if he were... if he were blind, still I would not be worried.” Matt accomplished extraordinary things. Fisk would never forget nor discredit their magnitude. He would never worry about their child while under his care and tutelage.

“He’s, uh, sleeping through the night now.” For that, Matt was exceedingly grateful. “I still hear him, every little noise, but he doesn’t cry.”

“Is it difficult,” Fisk asked, and he did not finish the question as Matt assumed, “to lie to your friends, to make them think you need more help than you do?”

It was. “They insist on helping me,” Matt said, “and I have to let them.” He could not perform tasks he should not be able to, not when Karen and Foggy were around. “I’ve lied to people most of my life,” he admitted. It was what he did. Matt lied about what he could do without anyone ordering it. He always had. “This is... It’s one more thing.”

“What will you tell him about me?” Fisk questioned, repeating what Matt had said to him when their situations were reversed. “When he asks, what will you say?” Fisk strove to ascertain his dedication to the truth and see how committed that relationship was.

“The truth is always an option,” Matt considered, “or its least horrifying version anyway. He can know the beginning, how we met. He can know where you are, parts of who you are. He can know those things without any of the facts in between. But honestly, I haven’t decided yet.”

“I would be... grateful if you didn’t tell him,” Fisk implored, “though I know you must think me brazen to ask.”

“Your conflict was with me, not him,” Matt said. “I know you care about him. I won’t ruin whatever relationship you might have one day by telling him everything.” Matt let his mercy sink in and fade before delivering his threat. “But I can. I’ll always have the truth, this... weapon. I won’t load it, and I won’t aim it— not without good reason.” Matt was not aware of his own mind. He did not know if he wanted Fisk to do good or if he wanted the man to give him a reason to inflict that suffering.

“Emotional, uh, blackmail, is it?” He was actually impressed. That emotion was in his voice. Just as Fisk himself was not all black, Matt was not all white. They were in the gray together. They were different shades of it that complimented one another. There was a reason they did well in those quiet, tender moments. “Was any of it real?” Fisk asked. He knew Matt played him, manipulated him. Maybe he even knew it in the moment. He did not know to what degree it ran.

Matt answered in the best, most humane way conceivable. “It could have been,” he said, “maybe. In another world, one where we... shared methods for a goal already the same, maybe then we could have...” His imagination was not vast enough to continue. He almost wished it was. Reality was too heavy and concrete, and Matt was a dour slave to it.

“We live in no world but this one,” Fisk said.

“Yes,” Matt agreed. “Yes. And in this one, on a... not so special day (a perfectly ordinary day, in fact), a man helped me up from the sidewalk when he had no reason to. He walked me home to make sure I was safe. We conceived a- a beautiful son. That’s real, Wilson.”

It was something for him to hold onto, like the photograph.

“That’s real,” Fisk murmured, repeating the assertion and letting himself believe it. That one day caused so much and meant so much. It was the first time they met and the last time they were able to know each other only on the surface. Ignorance was bliss. It was a cliché for a reason.

Matt lowered the photograph down to the table. He put his fingertips against the glass and pressed forward until his entire hand laid flat. It was such a smooth surface, only a few millimeters thick. That was the space between them when Fisk raised his hand on the other side and aligned each finger with Matt’s, eclipsing them behind his large hand. Matt felt him like the glass was not there.

“Be good, Fisk,” Matt ordered, requested, pleaded, “so you can see him.”

Fisk wanted that more than anything. He loved their son more than himself, more than the city. That was what he said. That was the truth. He took his hand away from the glass, away from Matt. “I don’t want to see him.” Fisk was a good father. He acted in his son’s best interest. He wanted to see him, but he knew what was most beneficial. Matt was the chosen parent for a reason. His were the morals upon which to raise a child. Fisk sat back against the thin cushion of his chair. “You should go.”

“I should.” Neither of them moved. How could they dissever themselves from such a devastating, lifelong impact? To each other, they were an open wound, unhealthy, unnatural. Soon, they would be a scar. The present conversation was needed for closure. It would heal as soon as Matt left.

It would end as soon as Matt left.

“Do not,” Fisk instructed, “come back.” It was crucial— for both their sakes— to maintain a distance and never instigate the circumstances of memory. So why did they delay the start of such a necessary process?

Matt picked the photograph of their son from the table. He would leave it for Fisk, as promised.

“Goodbye, Matthew.”

“Goodbye, Wilson.”

Together, they hung up their receiver.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And then they had lots of conjugal visits, right? ...Right? Nah, they did. .....Right?
> 
> Yes, I’m certain Fisk tried to escape capture. (He’s sacrificing but he’s not stupid.) Still got arrested though. Prison sentence... fifteen years? Sure. Maybe he’ll get time shaved off for good behavior. That’s on him. Although his bank accounts wouldn’t be frozen as evidence of ill-gotten funds like in the series, so he would have his entire fortune to control the prison with. And my sole regret is only JUST NOW considering the possibility of Fisk getting out on bail after his arrest but before the trial. Have Matt speak with him then. Maybe bring Daniel. But no. No, nevermind. No. With his various resources, the prosecutor could easily argue Fisk was a flight risk and have bail denied. Nevermind.
> 
> I like thinking that Fisk puts the photo Matt gave him in his cell and it’s his new, “It’s the last thing I see every night.”
> 
> And pointing out one more time the exclusivity of Matt’s perspective. All he knows is Vanessa wasn’t at Fisk’s trial. And since Fisk won’t talk about it, that could really just mean he didn’t want her associated with the charges. Or, as Matt infers, they broke up. Could have been after, could have been before. The world will never know.
> 
> Anyway, Fisk in prison. Kind of the best way I could think to end this. It felt right, just. Hope you liked it, the ending and the overall fic. Please, please, please comment and let me know what you thought.
> 
> And I maaaaaay write that conjugal visit sequel. So keep your eyes out. It won’t be canon to the rest of the fic though. It is a conjugal visit sex AU. Canonically, Matt is done having sex with Fisk. I want to say he’s done associating with him completely after this one visit, but they have a damn kid together. And Fisk gets out in fifteen years (minus time off for good behavior). Yeah, they’ll see each other again.
> 
> ALSO! To those of you sad to see the end of this fic, I do have an AU in mind. Alternate series of events following the first chapter (which still happens more or less the same). But this is an AU where Matt is actually blind and there is no Daredevil. So because Matt and Fisk aren’t enemies, there is a slightly higher chance for happiness. But still oh so much drama as it goes. And there will still be a pregnancy. Fun. So that’s in the works. Just don’t hold me to any deadline. While I have started writing this fic, I have not committed time to it yet. I don’t know when/if I will begin posting. I have other projects I need to work on before I revisit Daredevil. So after conjugal visit fic, this universe will be put on hold a little while.
> 
> Again, please comment. I’ve been writing this fic for over a year, and I’d love to hear if you liked it. Come on, you guys are awesome and amazing and numerous. This fic has almost 500 kudos. Just, you know, hit me up with a comment. I am not too proud to beg for validation.
> 
> I can't tell you how much the praise along the way has meant. I'll truly miss it. Special thank you to the people who commented on every chapter. Lots of love~
> 
> Thank you all for reading! ❤


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